Morgan
by youngjuliefinlay
Summary: Before Morgan Brody joined the Las Vegas Crime Lab, she had to struggle through a rough relationship with her family, particularly her father. She is desperate to get out of high school and into the real world unscathed, but she is still working on how to do that.
1. I

_Disclaimer: I do not own CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, the character of Morgan Brody, or any other characters that were previously established by CSI. I merely love Morgan and CSI from afar. :)_

**I**

When people first meet my father and me, they always automatically assume that I joined this profession because of him. Honestly, they couldn't be more wrong. I think it is a truly horrible coincidence that my father is in the same field of work that I am; as I've learned, it's just asking for people to make assumptions and suggest nepotism. Regarding the latter, maybe he does favour me over some of the other CSIs (I was informed when I first joined the team that him and Sara had a pretty epic battle back in the day, but lots of rumours fly around the lab), but it's not like I'm terrible at my job. I think I'm pretty good at it, most of the time. I'm not like Hodges; bragging that I'm the best or making offhanded remarks about other people's quality of work, but I have enough self-esteem to recognize that I'm not atrocious enough that one of my family members has to help me through the workforce. Especially my father; if I ever want to attempt to get help from a family member I know better than to choose him.

Generally, when people who have previously met my father meet me, they will make what they think is a charming comment about me following in his footsteps. I immediately correct them, telling them that they are most definitely out of line with their opinion. The person generally takes offence to it, and honestly, I couldn't care less. I would really prefer not to be compared to someone that caused me so much personal distress in the past.

Unless the person is too filled with disconcert to continue on with our conversation, and they sometimes are (from no fault of mine, just their own stupidity), they'll ask what the real reason I became a CSI is. The truth is, I don't really have a short answer for them. So, as I stutter over a quick, generic answer, I can feel their judgmental minds kick in, and they go back to thinking that I did just join this profession because of my dad. Once again, they are wrong, but it truly is a long story.

Following the separation of my parents when I was seven, my parents shuffled me around a lot. I was a bit of a burden to them, particularly my dad. How was he supposed to advance in his precious career if he had a kid to take care of? To him, I was no more than an unwanted responsibility that he was stuck with for a summer or for a school year. My mother was painfully aware of this, but she didn't always want the responsibility of me either. I was old news; her new boyfriend had come into the picture shortly after the divorce (I actually think it was before the divorce, but she's never actually confided in me to inform me of that). So, instead of her actually starting a conflict and trying to find a solution to something for once in my life, I sort of just floated between Los Angeles and Las Vegas. Whenever whoever I was currently residing with got tired of me, I was sent off to my other parent. I was a pretty expensive burden.

Switching between locations up to twice a year never really bothered me until I got a bit older. I was thirteen, and I had just arrived in Las Vegas for the summer, which I always hated. It was way too hot in the summer, and hanging out in my dad's apartment or his office got tedious after the first week or so. I didn't spend enough time in Vegas to have friends there; I barely even had friends in LA.

I hadn't been there in what felt like years, when in reality it was just nine months. I had changed a lot since I saw my dad last; I had grown about four inches, I didn't look so awkwardly stuck in the pre-teen era, and I had stopped being so tomboy-ish. My mother had even let me start wearing makeup that year, mainly because she was sick of my whining of how unfair life was and how all the other girls at school were allowed. I don't blame her; my teenaged whining even annoyed me sometimes.

My mother only told me I was going to be spending that summer with my dad about a week before my departure. It had caused a major fight between the two of us, ending with me threatening to run away. I don't think I realized at the time that this was exactly what my mother wanted; she was the one sending me away. Jerry, who was my mom's fiancé at the time, was once again given the responsibility of trying to diffuse the bomb that was I, which I never minded. Out of the three parental figures that I've had in my life, he was always my favourite when I was younger. This was mainly because Jerry didn't get into the whole "let's send Morgan on a plane to annoy my ex-spouse" business that my mother and father did.

So, despite my threats, my crying, and my whining, I was at the Las Vegas airport on the third day of summer vacation, searching for my father. After five minutes of searching, I assumed that he had forgotten about me, so I started searching the pockets of my jeans for coins that I could use at a payphone. As I stood helplessly in the middle of the bustling airport, soon realizing the only thing I had in my pocket was the bag that some airline pretzels once resided in, I was approached by a taller, red-haired woman who looked important. I immediately panicked and tried to think of what I could have possibly done to get in trouble after only five minutes of wandering through the airport.

"Are you Morgan?" she asked. I looked up at her, equal parts confused and scared.

"Yes," I said slowly. I sub-consciously reached up to my wavy golden-blonde hair and hastily pushed it behind my ear.

"I'm Catherine. Your dad sent me here to pick you up. Work got in the way. I'm sure you've heard that one before, knowing him," Catherine said with a slight laugh.

"Yeah, I have. How do you know him?" I asked. Even though I'm still certain my dad didn't particularly care about what happened to me when I was a kid, he always kept me educated on how to avoid child abductors, murderers, and the like.

"I work with him. I'll show you," she pulled an ID-looking object out of her purse. "See? Las Vegas Crime Lab."

At that point, I believed that she wasn't trying to abduct me, or if she was, she had at least put the effort in to convince me she was a safe person to get in a car with.

Later, when we were on our way to the lab, where I would have to sit and be silent for who knows how many hours, a thought danced across my mind.

"How did you know who to pick up at the airport?" I asked Catherine. She smiled at me.

"Your dad gave me a picture. Plus, you kind of look like him," she said. I grinned internally; I never thought my dad even kept the school pictures of me my mom reluctantly sent him in the mail. I used to think that the only reason he knew my eyes were grey was because they're the same colour as my mother's.

"Oh. Wait, I look like him? No, I don't. I'm nothing like him," I dismissed her statement about our resemblance as passively as I could. I really didn't want Catherine, the woman that I had only met an hour or so ago, starting to interrogate me about why I was so opposed to being anything like my father. Luckily, she dropped the issue and changed the subject.

After what seemed like not long enough, we arrived at the lab. I followed Catherine inside, received a visitor's pass from the front desk, and reluctantly made my way to my dad's office.

I knocked on the open door a couple times before going in, immediately feeling awkward and unwanted. I had been in the musky smelling, dimly lit office many times before, but it didn't make me feel any more welcome.

"Hey, Morgan," my dad said absent-mindedly, not even bothering to look up from whatever paperwork he was filling out.

"Hi," I said back, a slight tone of anger involuntarily filling my voice. I sat down in one of the chairs in front of his large, dull-looking desk. He still didn't look up at me; he was too engrossed in his work, as always, to be remotely interested in his only child. I sighed as I attempted to make myself more comfortable in what I'm pretty sure was the most uncomfortable chair ever. It was going to be a long summer.


	2. II

**II**

The first month of summer took dull to a whole new level. If I was in LA, I could have spent most of my time with my few close friends, or I could have at least gotten up to some independent adventures. Las Vegas isn't the most kid-friendly city, and it's not like I had permission to go anywhere or do anything exciting. Occasionally, I was a tag-along at the crime lab, but even then I was confined to my dad's office, which isn't anyone's idea of fun.

On one of the muggiest late afternoons of the year, I was stuck at the apartment, again, and I was going to be stuck there until late that night, or maybe even later than that. I'm pretty sure my father worked doubles just to avoid me. He always apologized, explaining the importance of his work over his daughter's sanity and well-being like it was totally normal, and I always just shrugged it off. I never wanted to give him the satisfaction that I liked him enough to actually open up about my feelings and emotions. He must have thought that he had a robot for a daughter, which makes me think that I might have caused more of the angst in the relationships with my parents than I would like.

Maybe it was the heat, or maybe it was just more of the same; dwelling on the neglect my dad provided, but I was desperate to get out of the apartment for the afternoon. I decided to go for a wander, which I always did at my mom's house during the summer. I threw a loose tank top and some of those classic high school era shorts, and headed out. There was no need or want to call and ask permission; I was going to be declined the privilege to explore, and it's not like he would have the time to pick up anyway.

Not totally sure of where I was going, as my sense of direction has always been a little off, I just headed where I felt was right at that moment, and I hoped it took me somewhere fun. I danced along the sidewalks, hoping I would find something of interest. There was no plan, and there was no desire to return home at a certain time; I didn't care as much as I thought my dad didn't.

Eventually, the sidewalks were covered with people, and I was totally unsure of where I was. I remember seeing what felt like hundreds of giant buildings, and thousands of people to match. Trying to push my instinctual panic at the disorientation away, I continued on my adventure. My lack of plan or just knowledge in general was actually pretty exhilarating; never had I had the freedom to just go where the wind blew me.

Looking back, it was rather stupid of me not to bring anything with me. The sun had diminished significantly, and even though I had no concept of my whereabouts, I knew the temperature was going to start dropping soon. I stopped walking for a moment to contemplate my choices. I could call the lab, admitting my stupidity and need for someone to help me, which I immediately dismissed. Instead, I was just going to turn around. It wouldn't be that hard to remember which ways I turned to get here from home.

I'm really lucky I wasn't abducted or murdered on the spot when I was trying to find my way back home. There was an extreme lack of kids my age walking around, and I must have been looking pretty vulnerable. Vulnerable to the point where a couple of cops began to ask me who I was, and if I was lost. Not wanting to admit defeat, I said I was on my way home, not lost or breaking the rules in the slightest. They asked my name, and I reluctantly told them, and before I knew it, I was in their car on the way to what I thought was home. It turned out it was my dad's version of his home.

He was pacing outside the lab, talking to a couple other cops. He looked distressed, and at first I wondered why. It took me a moment to let it sink it, but he was worried about me. Obviously, he had called, maybe he had even gone home, or sent someone to check on me, and he thought something bad had happened. Initially, I tried to make myself feel guilty and upset for causing such a hassle, but then I realized that I didn't have to do that. I could feel happy. I was allowing myself to feel happy about this. It wasn't just the joy of actually receiving some attention from him for once, but the fact that I had caused such anguish was truly making me feel better about myself. It made me feel capable of doing more than just being a burden, and it almost made me have my own warped sense of a purpose.

"Morgan!" I stepped out of the back of the car and looked at my dad, surprised at the look of relief on his face. I felt good at the distress I had caused, but I didn't know I could actually provide a sense of relief.

"Hi," I mumbled as I pushed my hair away from my face, fiddling with a few strands of it in the process.

"What happened? Are you okay? You scared me, M." I always had such mixed emotions about that nickname. On one hand, I appreciated it; it made me feel loved enough to warrant something as trivial as a shortened version of my name. On the other hand, it bugged me, because it was simply that; a shortened version of my name; it didn't come from some inside joke, or some bonding moment I shared with my father as a child. That would never happen.

"I'm fine. You didn't need to go and call the cops. I just went out for a while," I explained hastily. It honestly was a bit too big of a deal, if my dad knew me at all, he could have found me easily. Even my mother, who was more qualified for the Parent of the Year award, but not by much, could have found me easily if I had disappeared. I was always just meandering, investigating the neighbourhoods.

"You could have gotten yourself killed, Morgan. Don't pretend like this isn't a big deal. Why would you do something so stupid?" my dad asked, more and more tension rising in his voice.

"It's not like you would have cared! I'm surprised you noticed I was gone at all! You leave me for a whole day all by myself, and then expect me to just stay put every day? I'm sick of it, okay?" I yelled. I found my hair resting on my face again and ran my fingers through it quickly.

"I knew you were going to be an issue this summer from the second you arrived in my office. I didn't want to have to deal with teenage angst all summer, and now look what's happened. Why do you think you're getting shuffled around so much right now, Morgan? You're causing a headache for everyone." I felt the tears spring to the back of my eyes, but I kept blinking, as subtly as I could.

"Why don't you just send me back to mom's house, then? You obviously don't want me around, so why should I even be here?" I said shakily, trying my best to keep my composure.

"Maybe that's for the best."

Two days later, I found myself on a plane ride back to LA. I had barely seen my father over the last few days; Catherine had driven me home after the fight, and he had only come home once to arrange my way back to my preferred place of residence. It was so childish of him; merely sending his unwanted child back, but I wasn't going to fight it. On the way back to his apartment after the fight, I had cried to Catherine, internally crossing my fingers and toes that she wouldn't tell him about it. She seemed understanding enough, and she said some of the things that I really wanted to hear. It wasn't the same as being able to cry to a real parent, but I barely even know what that's like now.

On the plane ride back, I vowed to myself that I would never go back to Las Vegas to see my father. That miserable trip confirmed the fact that he was never going to be a good parent, and that I should give up any ounce of hope I had left. Surely, he would disagree, and for a brief moment of trying to make amends, he would invite me back. Or maybe, I just wanted that to happen, and he would actually just write me off as well. I didn't know which option I wanted more.


	3. III

**III**

Once I was back at my house of choice, the summer went by faster. The few friends that I had were around for most of the remainder of the vacation, and LA was definitely more kid-friendly. What really sped the summer up was knowing that school was coming back into session sooner rather than later; I was truly dreading the idea.

After I had been shipped back to my mother, the whole situation that got me sent home had been a bit muddied. Despite my explanations, she was tending to agree with my dad for once in her life; I had done something stupid, and I was only trying to be a pest. This, of course, infuriated me to no end, but there wasn't much I could do. My stubbornness didn't just come out of thin air; genes are a powerful thing.

So, after countless fights with my mom, and even my almost-step-dad a couple of times, I was switching schools. My mother decided she wanted me closer to home, so she could keep a closer watch on me. My freshman year had gone perfectly smoothly, as had every year before that, but I guess she felt sticking me in a brand new environment would be the perfect thing for my supposed defiance and anger. The whole idea didn't really bother me from an education perspective, but the whole social aspect was really eating away at my mind.

Ever since my parents decided to split up, my desire to be social had dwindled. The divorce had kind of ruined my self-esteem, which was of course all thanks to my father's lack of communication and ill-conceived ideas of how to talk to his daughter, but that's a different story. Being around people I didn't know had slowly been making me more and more nervous, and I knew that going to a place full of more than a thousand people I had never even seen before wasn't going to help that. I tried to explain this to my mother without admitting that I had any weakness whatsoever, but that was a frivolous attempt. Never wanting to admit any personal flaw or weakness to my parents really had its disadvantages.

For the last few days before school started, my whole existence felt like a blur. I spent almost every moment wishing for the summer to restart; I would even go back to living with my dad if it meant that I didn't have to go to school. I could barely eat, which was definitely out of character, and my last remaining nights of freedom included little to no proper sleep.

On the first day, I woke up in a panic long before my alarm. There was no point in trying to go back to sleep or even just lie in bed until it was time to actually get up; I was too nervous to be alone with my thoughts. Using my extra time well, I tried to make myself look as presentable as I could, without looking like I tried too hard. Every possible bad scenario ran through my head, making me feel like there was absolutely zero chance of a positive outcome.

My mom drove me to school in an attempt to make peace. The atmosphere around the house hadn't exactly been all that nice, and I think she was willing to do just about anything to get me back to normal. Well, she wasn't willing to change her mind about her decision on my education, but she was trying to make up for that. In the car, I wanted to delve into my true fears about what was going to be happening, but I couldn't. I couldn't bring myself to admit that there was something wrong with me. Being nervous the way I was couldn't have been normal, human beings should not be allowed to feel that way.

She dropped me off a little less than half a block away from the school, per my request. I did not want to be the brand new sophomore who had their mom drop them off at the door. It took me a few minutes to get to the actual school building, but it felt like the shortest walk of my life. In my attempt to hold myself together, I found the nearest washroom and let myself have a few minutes to relax before I attempted to find the homeroom class I was supposed to be attending. Looking myself in the mirror, the only thing that was plaguing my mind was the fact that I was probably just unwanted by everyone; if my own father didn't want me around, what was my peer group going to think? I overanalyzed every possible detail of my appearance, trying to find something I could say I felt confident about. Would people notice my slightly swollen eyes from all of my crying lately? What if they did, would they care? All of the variables made me feel sick.

Eventually, I willed myself to leave the mirror to find my homeroom class. I tried to talk myself down from the criticism I was placing on my own shoulders, but I couldn't shake the feeling of not being good enough. While I searched for my name on the long list of last names that began with the early letters of the alphabet, I tried to find something to occupy my hands. They eventually instinctually found my hair; making me feel a little less awkward. The list told me what room number I had to navigate to, which was another headache in itself. If anyone else that wasn't a complete stranger was here with me, they would have told me to simply ask someone who looked like they knew what was happening. That wasn't an option. I would just have to find it for myself; it's not like I wasn't used to being alone.

After only a few minutes of wandering through the bustling hallways, I found the right room, and I quickly peaked inside. There were other kids in there, socializing and having a good time, like any kids would on the first day of school. It made me wish I was at my old school, catching up with my friends and feeling like there was a place I could truly fit in. Taking a deep breath, I took a few steps inside, and sat down at the nearest desk I could. Nobody was next to me, and it was almost like nobody even noticed I was there, although I felt like everyone's eyes were burning into the back of my skull. I assured myself they weren't, and it was just my nervous brain imagining things, but it felt realistic enough to make me want to leave.

A few minutes passed of me sitting in silence while everyone else interacted around me, and then the teacher finally spoke and gave a typical first day spiel. I tried to focus on what she was saying, but I couldn't even do that without feeling overly aware of myself. There was a chance I was paying attention too closely, and other kids would immediately label me as a nerd or a teacher's pet, or maybe I wasn't paying enough attention, and the teacher was going to call me out on it. She asked if anyone was new to the school, and it killed me to put my hand up. I was welcomed, but all the while I could feel the eyes on me, and it made me want to crawl out of my skin. During the whole first day experience, I couldn't help but wonder why the one time my mother agreed with my father, the outcome had to be as terrible as this.

My mother picked me up in the same spot where she had dropped me off, and the walk back felt significantly longer. This had to be because there were many other kids walking home, or walking to cars like me, surrounding me. It made me feel uneasy; what if someone recognized me and pointed me out to their friends as the new kid? That thought reminded me that nobody would take the time out of their current conversations to do this; I was definitely not important enough for something like that.

"How was it?" my mother asked as I opened the door and sat down in the passenger's seat. I brushed my hair back and grabbed a few strands to twiddle between my fingers.

"It was fine, it's just school," I said, like it was that simple. I wanted to tell her how truly horrific it had been for me, and I had only been there for a little over half an hour. I wanted to tell her that I couldn't go for a full day tomorrow; I would surely die of embarrassment or just nervousness.

"That's good, I was worried about you." My heart jumped a little as she said that. It gave me the slightest sliver of confidence that there actually was someone in the world that was worried for me, but at the same time, I felt a little miffed.

"If you were really worried, you wouldn't have sent me in the first place. You would have trusted me enough to believe what dad said was all garbage, and you would believe that he doesn't care about me. You know he doesn't, but you just don't want to tell me. You should just believe what I've told you, but you won't do that, because you think I'm some monster that's stolen your real daughter from you, so you had to punish me by making me do something that is going to ruin my life," I shot back, not even aware of what I was saying. I had so much bottled up anger, and its tendencies to spill at unwanted times kind of messed up the attitude I tried to pull off most of the time.

"Morgan, your dad does care about you. You know that, so don't make yourself the victim," she replied as she started the car and pulled out of the parking spot. I didn't want to pity her response to me with another response, so I just kept quiet and stared out the window. Tomorrow was going to be truly awful, but at least it would be a break from the other truly awful aspect; my delusional mother.

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Thanks for reading and reviewing! Makes my day, week, month, year, etc. :) The story line of Morgan going to a new school hits extremely close to home for me, and I enjoy being able to express the thoughts I've had over the past few months. I've liked having Morgan sharing a few traits with me:)


	4. IV

I would just like to thank everyone so much for reading, reviewing, following, and favouriting! I can't reply to reviews yet because I'm on a 24 hour waiting period because I'm a new account, but I will when I can! This has been such a cool experience for me already :) So, I'm writing a lot about Morgan's school, and I'm using sophomore/junior, etc. (we don't use that in Canada), but I'm calling the courses the same names we do in Canada (the subject with the grade number after it) because I don't know how they're named in America...sorry! Hope you're enjoying, I absolutely love writing about Morgan, one of my favourite characters ever :)

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**IV**

Despite the fact that I had never felt more petrified over anything in my entire life, I was sitting in my first class of my sophomore year. It was Science 10, a class that I was really looking forward to in theory. However, I don't think it was actually possible to have the feeling of excitement for anything regarding this experience, except being able to go home at the end of the day.

In my effort to not make a complete and utter fool of myself by running into class late, I had decided to get there early. I soon found out that sitting in a classroom by yourself, waiting for other people to show up, is probably more humiliating than being late. Watching other people slowly filter in and purposely avoid sitting with me made my stomach drop with anxiety. I couldn't help but feel that if I had chosen to find my class after the first chime of the morning bell; my nerves would have been just slightly more at peace. Instead, I was plagued with the fear that these other students were making the decision to sit away from me because I was the loser that showed up early and on time. But, even if I had showed up at the same time, nobody would have wanted to sit with me. I knew that, but it made more sense in my mind to make whatever scenario was actually happening the worse one. I also realized that if someone did sit next to me, I would have to speak with them, and that scared me just as much, if not more, than having everyone leave me alone.

Eventually, there were only so many spots left, and the unfortunate individuals who didn't show up quite as fast would have to be stuck with me. I waited patiently, pretending to shuffle papers in my notebook around, when really I was subtly watching the door. A girl did walk in, and she looked nice enough, and normal enough, to be a potential new friend. Even though I was desperate to not be a complete loner for the year, I did have some standards. The girl strode over to the table I was residing at, and it looked like she was going to sit beside me. I smiled at her, because a mumbling of "hello" seemed to be caught in my larynx. She gave me a half-smile back while she picked up the chair next to me and moved it two tables over to where her friends sat. My heart sank, and I immediately felt my face flush crimson. Surely everyone had seen that, and they were all internally laughing at me.

Once the second bell chimed, the rest of the hour and twenty minutes was slightly better than the first five. The teacher, a stereotypical science nerd, talked for the majority of the class, which I didn't mind for once. Anything that kept me from being in an awkward situation was welcome in my life, even though such opportunities did not come around frequently.

The rest of the day was more of the same fear and anguish, which included sitting outside of my locker to eat my lunch, praying anyone would take pity on me and ask me to hang out with them. As I sat there with my thoughts, I thought of other kids who have been in my position for their whole life. How did they get used to it; not talking to peers all day, and constantly having the fear of judgment rattling their mind? Or worse, was I going to have to get used to the same thing?

Later in the day, when I was finally at home, I had gotten into yet another fight with my mother. She had mocked my inability to make friends, which had actually really bothered me, as she was the one who put me in the situation. Everything had gotten pretty heated, and eventually she decided to leave with Jerry to who knows where for some time away from me. I pretended that didn't bother me. I repeatedly told myself that there was a bright side; I had to house all to myself for a couple hours. That was always something I really did enjoy, even though I never fully exploited the opportunity like every other teenager would. There were no parties or even friends over when I was the only person left in the house; it always just ended up being me and homework, or me and procrastination. It was usually the latter.

While I was in the middle of singing along to whatever song I had typed into YouTube at that juncture, the phone rang. I sighed and cursed my mother yet again for never agreeing to spend the money on caller ID, meaning I had to answer the phone and risk talking to a stranger, or worse, my father.

"Hello?" I said as I turned the volume down on the computer speakers. A rush of an anxious feeling quickly trickled through my brain; the moment of not knowing who was on the other line after answering was one of my most hated feelings.

"Hey, M, is your mom there?" the familiar voice of my father poisoned my ears. I wanted to hang up the phone right there, but who knows what that would make my mother do. She had already sent me off to what was essentially my own personal hell, but she could probably come up with something much worse. Even though they hated each other now, her and my dad must have had a lot in common at some point.

"No," I replied sharply. It wasn't his fault for not knowing that, of course, but it made sense to me to make him feel like it was.

"Oh, alright. Tell her I called. How was your day?" I sighed audibly into the phone. I really didn't want to take part in any form of conversation with this man, despite the fact he seemingly wanted to make peace. That did not sound like a viable option to me, therefore it couldn't happen. Why should I accept any apologies, or worse, be forced to come up with some apology, for the world's worst father?

"It was fine. I'll tell her you called," I told him quickly, still maintaining my icy tone. Honestly, it didn't matter to me that I was coming across as rude; it actually made me just the tiniest bit better.

"Morgan, listen…"

"I don't want to listen. I don't want to hear a made up apology, or worse, an explanation of why you're not going to apologize. If you don't want me around, I won't be around, even on the phone," I exclaimed angrily, quickly hanging up the phone afterwards. I knew there was going to be a price to pay for my quick temper, but there always was, so I was used to it.

The following days continued as the first one had; an anxiety filled day at school, followed by some unfortunate event at home. Convincing myself that there could be worse, I powered through it like it was a completely typical week. I lied to my mom, telling her I had made a couple of friends, even though in reality, that couldn't be further from the truth. I guess I would just have to get used to being a loser that couldn't even maintain a healthy relationship with her own parents.

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I'll be uploading more chapters shortly :) Although this chapter is a little short, I really enjoyed writing it because it pretty much mirrors my exact experience on my first full day of school this year, so writing as though someone else went through the exact same thing is nice (especially when it's my favourite fictional character, haha.) Thank you for reading!xo -Camille


	5. V

Thank you to everyone who has given me (and Morgan) a chance :) Much love! Enjoy! There's a little shout out to season 7 of CSI in here, it's very subtle but it's still there!

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**V**

Despite the pure feeling of dread that accompanied me every single day, the first two months of school flew by. With the nerves dragging down my day, it would make sense that the weeks would drag, but that was not the case. I guess the feeling of having to actually go back into the building sped time up; whenever I got an anxious feeling, it often made time appear to pass much faster. My lack of homework also gave the days a bit less of a drag to them. School always came naturally to me, and the fact that I didn't have many distractions in terms of socialization in my classes contributed to the amount of effort I had to put into my education while I was at home, or lack thereof.

I was slowly starting to make a few friends, but they honestly just made me feel worse about myself without trying to. They, of course, were already familiar with each other from the previous year, making me a prominent outsider. I was positive they were viewing me the way I was viewing myself; unwanted and too nervous to actually maintain a relationship of substance. If being the outsider wasn't enough, being overly aware of this contributed to my inability to get past that awkward stage of friendship. I wanted nothing more than to be able to just be sarcastic and goofy like I typically was with my old friends, but my mind told me I couldn't whenever the opportunity came up. Thinking about the fact that these people didn't know me made me jump to the conclusion that they were spending every moment they spent with me as a chance to judge any of my potential flaws (and trust me, I was aware of a lot of them), which made my desire to be myself dwindle.

While I prevented myself from socializing properly, I wondered when it would just come naturally to be just Morgan-like. This obviously didn't happen with my other friends; I was completely comfortable with not even thinking about any potential judgment with them, but that didn't make much of a difference as I sat with these strangers at lunch. Would they always just think I was some painfully shy loser who never could contribute to a conversation properly? Did they think I was a burden; did they flip a coin to see who had to try and make conversation with me on any given day? To me, this was a perfectly logical conclusion.

At the beginning of another dreaded week, my first class after lunch was English, which I simply adored. I really enjoyed the actual subject of the class, and my teacher was pretty cool, but there was another reason why I loved going there so much. There was assigned seating. For my ten previous years of education, I had hated assigned seating with every fibre of my being, just like any other kid. I'm sure everyone else in my class still hated it in this year, but I worshiped the idea. When you lose the complete and utter stress of choosing where to sit every day, it makes your life a little easier. I didn't have to walk in and legitimately want to start crying out of the worry of picking the wrong place to sit. I could just walk in, head to my assigned seat, and not make conversation with whatever Neanderthal was sitting next to me because he was too concerned with flirting with whatever stereotypical popular high school girl was behind or in front of him. (I was way too nerdy for his liking; I actually did _work_ in class. Shocking, I know.) This made me look forward to going to English each day; it was almost like a break from my anxious behaviors.

On this particular day, my teacher decided to rearrange our seating, which honestly made me a little worried. I wasn't looking to sit with someone who wanted to try and chat with me or worse, pick out my flaws and exploit them. I knew Ms. Delancey liked me though, so she probably wouldn't completely screw me over, but there was always a chance of disaster.

After an agonizing few minutes of being rearranged, my emotions settled down when I was told to sit next to one of the somewhat quieter boys in the class. He wasn't shy, but he wasn't loud and obnoxious like a few of them were. Also, he was rather cute, in my opinion. I was unsure of his name, but that was no surprise. Having dozens of names spat in your direction for two months straight is an easy way to never remember any of them. Once I was informed of my seat, I took a second to try to silence the slow feeling of worrying creeping into my stomach, and then I sat down in one of the extremely uncomfortable blue chairs and set my English binder on my new desk.

"Hey, newbie," he said with a bit of a smile-like smirk. I gave a bit of a nervous laugh and silently cursed that it was still painfully obvious that I was a new student after two months.

"Hey. It's Morgan," I said quietly with a smile. He looked at me and I had a very brief moment of awkward eye contact before I slightly darted my eyes to the side. His bright brown eyes were too nice to be stuck looking into mine.

"Nice to meet you. I'm Ethan," he replied as I gave an internal sigh of relief that he didn't assume I already knew his name. As an extra beat of a second passed without me responding, I involuntarily grabbed several strands of my straightened hair and started twisting it around my index finger.

"Nice to meet you, too," I said, awkwardly halting the brief flow of conversation we had going. Oh well, if Ethan was going to stuck with me for a few weeks, he might as well learn that I can't hold any form of communication without a lot of assistance on his part.

"How was your summer?" he asked with a smile on his face, like he knew that I felt totally out of my element. First of all, I was interacting with a boy, and that rarely ever happened even when I was in an environment I was more comfortable with. Second of all, he was actually continuing our socialization, whereas my previous seating partner didn't even start it in the first place.

"Well, it was alright, I guess. I was at my dad's for about half of it, but then I… came back here for the rest of it, which made everything a little more tolerable. It all could've been better though... Anyway, how about you?" I asked, mentally scolding myself for over-talking a little bit, but praising myself for making good word choices so I didn't come across as having an incredibly dysfunctional family. Nobody should have to know the truth about that.

As Ethan delved into some of the details of his summer, I couldn't help but get distracted by how he actually could communicate in a friendly manner, unlike most boys at this school. He didn't seem to care that I was so much more awkward than he was, and he was genuinely nice. Also, as I mentioned, he was cute, and that didn't help my distraction. He had dark hair, which was a quality that teenage Morgan coveted in men, and even when we were both sitting I could tell he was tall.

"Do you have anywhere to eat lunch here? Not to be rude, but since you're new and all," Ethan asked. My heart gave a small leap that could have been from happiness or nerves, or a combination of the two.

"Well, kind of, but I don't know the girls I eat with very well, so if I can't find them or they go somewhere without me, I'm kind of stuck," I explained quickly, not wanting to come across as though I actually enjoyed eating lunch with them.

"You should come hang out with me. I'm always around the science corridor right from the start of lunch, if you want," he suggested with a light tone. I had to hold in a happy squeal of joy.

"Yeah, that would be cool," I said, trying to sound passive, but with an undertone of being ecstatic.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, definitely, really cool," I said with a grin. It was one of the first real smiles I had mustered this school year, and it felt pretty awesome. At that point, a new assignment was being handed out and explained, so I lacked an opportunity to continue on with one of the best conversations I had shared with someone in a while. Plus, the someone I shared the conversation with was getting cuter by the second.

After saying goodbye to my newest acquaintance, I exited the classroom with more evidence of happiness that I had had in a long time. I wasn't darting my eyes to the ground to avoid knowing there were people looking at me, and I had a bit more confidence as I walked. I'm not saying I was pushing people out of my way to get to my last class, but I just had the smallest essence of confidence to me. I longed for someone I could tell about my exciting news, but I had lost most of the contact with my old friends, so sharing this with them would probably make them wonder if I'd gone off the deep end. I couldn't tell my mom; she would either mock me for having a crush on someone (and this was not a crush. At all. I don't get "crushes.") or give me a long lecture about I don't even want to know what. This was something I'd just have to keep to myself, and keeping things I was excited about to myself was something I would just have to get used to.

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I just want to say that this new character I have introduced is not for the purpose of a fluffy relationship or anything, there is definitely a story line there that will add plot :) Thanks again for reading!


	6. VI

So I kind of realized last night as I was doing a brief proofread of this that Facebook wouldn't have existed at this point in time (I'm assuming the writers believe Morgan to be around the same age as Elisabeth Harnois, which would mean that she would be a teenager around the mid 90s), but I've just left it in there because it's such a brief reference and I don't even know if people could chat on MySpace/MSN/etc. :) Enjoy and thank you for reading!

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**VI**

For the past two weeks, I had been wandering down to one of the many science classrooms once the bell for lunch rang and spending the whole hour and ten minutes with Ethan and a couple of his other friends. It was actually quite lovely, and it got less and less awkward with every minute. I let myself be a bit weirder than I usually am at school, and despite the fear of judgment it caused me for a few minutes afterwards, it almost felt like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. Once the warning bell rang for third block, my confidence usually slipped away, but it was nice to have a bit of a break in the middle of the day. Ethan's friends were all extremely awesome, as was he of course, and I got along with each one of them.

"So, Morgan, how did you get invited to eat lunch with us? We are kind of a big deal, you know. Kids who eat lunch in the science room are basically celebrities around here," Jeanette, one of my favourite members of this new group, asked me. Jeanette was a junior, and she had an aptitude for being able to come up with a snappy remark for absolutely anything. It was slightly intimidating, as I was always used to being the most sarcastic around my friends, but Jeanette had definitely cemented herself in that role.

"We're in the same English class, and Ms. Delancey just rearranged her seating plan on Monday. He was definitely a step up from the loser I had been sitting beside for almost a month," I laughed, and Jeanette joined in.

"I know how you feel. That woman had it out for me, I swear. I was always stuck with the absolute stupidest people at this school in my freshman year. Maybe that's why I'm so bitter now," Jeanette said with a smirk. I laughed again without even thinking about it, which was a major change from even last week. I usually had to force myself to laugh to not come across as rude, because I was too wrapped up in how to act to actually live in the moment and appreciate the humour in something.

We continued along on our conversation, which wasn't just the awkward small talk that I'm usually privy to with people that I'm not totally familiar with. Each person in that room was, for some reason, not nearly as intimidating as everyone else at the school, and some of them were even seniors. The whole atmosphere was way more relaxed; probably because nobody cared what people thought of them, which was refreshing. Of course, I still cared what people thought of me, but maybe my worries would be reduced after spending more time with people who didn't.

Besides seeing him during lunch, I also got to see Ethan every day in English, and that always made my day just a little bit brighter. He was such a genuinely kind person, and I felt like I liked him a little more each time I saw him. I would, of course, never admit to anyone that I believed I was developing mildly strong feelings for him, or as strong as a fifteen year old girl's feelings about another fifteen year old could be. Often, the thought of whether or not he felt the same way danced into my mind, but the possibility of that made me lose all ability of focusing on the real world, so I tried to avoid thinking about it.

After staying up rather late one night talking to Ethan on Facebook, which was becoming a bit of a bad habit for both of us, I had neglected to finish the last paragraph for an assignment's rough draft in English. I, of course, didn't remember until I first stepped foot in the classroom, so I rushed to my seat and frantically pulled the slightly crumpled piece of paper out of my bag to finish it.

"You didn't finish your homework, Morg? That's not exactly your typical overachiever style," Ethan said jokingly, and I gave him a half-glare, half-grin. One of his favourite things was to tease me about my above average grades in the class, and I pretended it annoyed me, but we both knew I didn't mind in the least. Another thing I most definitely didn't mind was the nickname he had taken to calling me. I found it incredibly sweet that someone actually liked me enough to call me a cute little version of my name. Sure, my dad had his lame interpretation of a nickname for me, but this was Ethan.

"It's your fault, actually, because you distracted me, so I forgot!" I exclaimed back at him with a laugh. He laughed as well, and we both knew full well that I was not complaining about the distraction.

"Well, whether it was my fault or not, which it definitely was not, if Ms. Delancey catches you, you're dead. Trust me, I know," he said. I looked back at him curiously.

"How do you know? You always have your stuff ready on time, and I thought you didn't have her last year," I asked, puzzled.

"I was in her class last year. It's a little known secret, but this is my second time in English 10," he said, a little quieter than the rest of our conversation had been. I raised one eyebrow, a talent I had perfected at a young age after seeing some television character or something utilizing the technique.

"Oh yeah?" I said, not sure of what else to say, as I wasn't totally sure if he would want to elaborate. If I ever had to take a class twice, I would be completely mortified.

"Yeah, I'm actually a junior. I'm just posing as a sophomore, because last year was kind of rough academically for me. Once I met Jeanette and the rest of them, I kind of forgot about school and devoted most of my time to hanging out with them, even when I was supposed to be here," Ethan explained to me. I was honestly a little shocked; not only was Ethan not the perfect poster child for everything like I thought he was, but he was a year older than me. The latter kind of made me like him a little more.

"That surprises me, I think. I never thought of Jeanette as a bad kid," I replied, deflecting responsibility of Ethan failing a course to Jeanette, because I believed that was a way of making sure he still knew that I liked him the best.

"Well, don't go around telling everyone this, but we briefly dated last year, and that's what was so much of a distraction for me." I smiled a little at this.

"Oh, really? That must have been a bit of a shock to the system when she explained why she was breaking up with you, then," I said jokingly and we both laughed. Jeanette was very open about the fact that she was a lesbian; it was one of the first things she had told me when I met her. It was nice to be friends with someone who truly didn't give a damn about what anyone thought, and didn't act like her being attracted to the same gender was ground-breaking material.

"Just a little, I was a little heartbroken for a while; she was my first girlfriend and all," Ethan replied, still a bit of humour in his tone. As he said that, my pencil flew out of my hand from my frantic writing, something that happened frequently, and it landed on the ground in between our seats. We both leaned down to get it, and he reached it just before me. My hand brushed by his, and a small little burst of electricity ran through my body.

"Thanks," I said, my voice all of a sudden dropping in volume. There was a bit of a pause, and it was undecided whether it was an awkward pause or not. Maybe it could be classified as somewhere in between normal and nearing uncomfortable.

"You know, I've been thinking lately that you would be the best choice for my second girlfriend," Ethan said sincerely, with the direct eye contact that bothered me with everyone else but him. However, this time, I was completely unsure of how to proceed, so I felt a little overly self-aware.

"…I think that's a very good idea."

"So, you're saying yes to my proposal?"

"Yes."

"Yes?"

"Yes!" I repeated, while I tried to hide the extremely large grin that was creeping across my face.

"Oh, cool. No big deal, right? That was just a casual question of course," he said, breaking my nerves and making me feel totally comfortable again.

"Of course. Guys ask me out all the time, obviously, so it's definitely just a regular old question for me," I chirped back, totally forgetting about my English homework for the more important situation that was going down. It was basically done, and it's not like I really cared at this point in time.

"Well, I can see why, you are kind of the most gorgeous girl at this school," Ethan said smoothly as the bell rang and Ms. Delancey started talking.

"Very smooth," I whispered under my breath.

"I've been wanting to say it for a while."

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I really hope that dialogue wasn't too cheesy for anyone's liking... my best friend acts as my editor and she said it was cute, but I'm still a bit wary of it. Haha. Hope you enjoyed, please write a review if you so desire, they make me smile. :)


	7. VII

Thanks to everyone for reading! This chapter is definitely very much a filler chapter, but there's definitely lots of plot development next chapter, I assure you. Haha. Hope you enjoy!

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**VII**

As Christmas and New Year's came and went, I was becoming happier and happier every day. At the beginning of the year, I would never have guessed that I would have what I believed to be the most amazing boyfriend ever. I'm sure every other teenager in a similar position as me would have felt the same way, but that never crossed my mind, and it wouldn't have put a damper on my spirits, either. Besides me being happy, Ethan was happy, too, as were all of our friends. Everyone said they "saw it coming" and "it was only a matter of time" which made my heart dance more than I would like to admit; other people thinking highly of my relationship choice shouldn't have affected me so much, but it did. Deep down, I was still so concerned with what people were thinking of me at every moment of the day. I was certainly more distracted than I was at the beginning of the year, but I still had a fearful feeling eating away at me.

I neglected to tell anyone outside of school of my relationship status, and this was on purpose. If my mother found out that I had a boyfriend, let alone a boyfriend who had recently turned seventeen in the days following the New Year, she would have had a heart attack. After her recovery from said heart attack, she would've probably just teased me about it, or worse, asked me prying questions about the various activities we got up to (which was nothing all that terrible, I swear). If I told my still almost-step-dad, he would have just subtly tattled to my mother, risking his chance of me revoking his status as favourite parental figure. And then there was my father, of course. Confiding in him about absolutely anything would never, ever happen. My mother still made me call him every once in a while, and she tried to guilt me into it by saying he had been asking when I was going to be able to talk to him, but I could not have cared any less.

I had a horrible feeling my mother was going to find out about me and Ethan eventually. I was leaving the house way more than I ever had, and I spent a lot of time either outside or in my room on the phone. If I wasn't talking on the phone, I was texting, or I was on the computer on Facebook or some social media of the like. This made me privy to a few interrogations, but she still really wasn't attentive enough to notice something was all that different. Sure, our relationship had drastically improved since my sullen first month or so of school, but it's not like we were all that close. Still, it's not like she was blind; she could see when cars came to pick me up. It was almost always Jeanette, who understood my need to keep my social life to myself, therefore she acted as my taxi to Ethan's house or wherever we had decided on going for that specific day. It was pretty exciting, being involved in this secret relationship. Ethan and I always laughed to ourselves while we were studying Romeo and Juliet in English; pretending it was like us…without the death.

After Winter Break, the fact that the semester was ending soon was particularly prominent in my mind, which was definitely a major downer. Since Ethan was somewhat secretly a junior in disguise, so to speak, we wouldn't have any more opportunities to sit together in class, secretly holding hands under the desks where Ms. Delancey either couldn't see us or pretended she couldn't. Thankfully, she hadn't done a rearrangement of our seating plan; maybe she secretly thought Ethan and I were cute together and didn't want to separate us in our last few months of having a class with one another. We would still see each other every day, obviously, but being able to spend an extra hour and twenty minutes next to each other each day was one of my favourite things.

I brought up how sad I was about the approaching change with everyone at lunch, which of course sparked many sarcastic comments, mostly everyone acting in a fake sympathetic manner, asking how I would ever survive. Ethan stretched upwards to kiss my forehead, as I was sitting on his lap at the time, which is probably part of why I was receiving such sarcastic feedback, and he agreed that it was really just going to suck.

"You guys see each other basically every other waking moment of the day, Morgan, I'm sure you're going to manage somehow," Jeanette said saucily as she pulled her messy brown hair into a bun on top of her head.

"Well, sure, but being in class together is probably the only time she doesn't have her tongue down Ethan's throat," Ethan's close friend, Josh, remarked. I scoffed and glared at him, appalled.

"That's not true! Right?" I exclaimed, looking at Ethan to back me up. He gave me a devilish smile that gave me the sneaking suspicion I wasn't going to like his answer.

"Oh, of course, Morg, it's only some of the time," he said with a giant grin on his face. Josh, and all of the other guys, and a couple of the girls, laughed hysterically. I felt my cheeks heat up, and I looked down at him, my expression asking why he had to say that. Of course, his statement had the slightest of truths behind it, so I kind of had to own up to that.

"You're mean," I said with a fake pout. He continued to smile at me.

"And you're cute." I grinned at that, wrapping my arms around his neck. At that moment, the bell rang, and I sighed heavily, not wanting the break to ever end.

"Don't miss me too much," I giggled. He kissed me, and it was definitely for a few moments longer than what should have been happening at school in a classroom, but I wasn't going to protest. My stomach leapt with butterflies, and they continued after he pulled away. I looked up into his deep, brown eyes and smiled. I had been smiling an awful lot lately, and it was really quite lovely.

"I love you." I gasped just the tiniest of gasps, and searched through his eyes for sincerity, truly hoping it was there.

"I love you, too," I said back with little hesitation. We both realized that despite the major step in our relationship, we really did have to go to class, so I grasped Ethan's hand, intertwining our fingers, and rested my head on his arm (I was too short for my head to reach his shoulder, which was a quality that I thought made us very cute together) as we walked to our respective lockers. Suddenly remembering my first few weeks at school, I was more than pleased to realize how lucky I had somewhat quickly become. If it wasn't for Ethan asking me to eat lunch with him and his friends, I still would have been the lonely, sad, unwanted version of myself that still barely lingered in me.

Upon returning home that afternoon, I still felt as if I was on top of the world after the exchange of seven words between my boyfriend and I that occurred at the end of lunch. I was desperate to tell someone new, but I had already exhausted all my potential sources, and it's not like there were very many to begin with. I briefly pondered telling my mother, but that would just end awkwardly or angrily, probably both, and I just wasn't in the mood for that. There was the brief thought of calling or texting one of my old friends, but I had barely spoken with them since the very beginnings of the school year. They would probably just write me off as that girl who ditched them and then called up months later to boast about her thriving relationship. As I meandered up the carpeted staircase to my room, I noticed a note on the doorway telling me to call my dad. Yeah, like that was going to happen. He was not going to ruin my mood right now. Deciding to leave the note on the door as a reply to my mother that I was not planning on acting on her order, I slipped into my room, leapt onto my bed, and logged onto my computer.

I scrolled through my emails, trying to find someone that I could gush to about my day. The options consisted of nobody, and just as I was about to give up and resort to calling Ethan to talk about essentially nothing of substance for the next hour, I saw a slightly intriguing email at the top of my inbox. It was from Catherine, who had basically been my hero during the summer. She had written to me to ask how I was doing, how school was going so far, and if I was going to be coming back to Vegas to visit anytime soon. The note made my heart rather happy; at least someone in Vegas truly cared about my feelings, and she wasn't even related to me. I immediately responded, telling her probably more than what she wanted to know about my life, including my awesome day. I threw in a couple questions about how things at the crime lab were to not seem narcissistic or rude. Honestly, her job really intrigued me, even though she worked in the same building as my father. When I looked past that, it was quite a fascinating profession, and I was genuinely a bit curious about it.

I quickly pressed send before overthinking prevented me from replying, and smiled. Maybe I would continue to have struggles making connections with my actual parents, but someone as cool as Catherine was an individual I could certainly get used to talking to on a regular basis about my life.

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Thank you for reading, hope you enjoyed a bit of fluffy filler with a dash of teenage angst before the next chapter gets a bit intense. Leave a review if you wish, I love reading them! :) Thanks again!


	8. VIII

_This chapter was fun to write... Well, most of it. Haha. Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoy Morgan's shenanigans!_

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**VIII**

The English 10 final exam had come and gone, meaning it was time to both celebrate the brief break after all the exams, as well as wallow in despair about no longer being enrolled in English. Everyone still continued to poke fun at my sadness about the issue, but I honestly didn't care, because it really sucked. Ethan and I had gotten significantly closer over the past few weeks, and I didn't want any of it to change in the slightest. After finally being content with the majority of the aspects in my life, I hated that everything had to be slightly shifted. It's not like I was moving back to Vegas or anything, and the mere thought would have made me shudder, but it was just something I wanted to avoid altogether. Jeanette tried to imply that I was revolving my life around my boyfriend too much, but I was not having any of that. I loved him, or at least I thought I did, and spending as much time as I could with him was important to me.

On the Thursday afternoon of exam week, everyone was finally done with last minute studying and stress-crying over the prospect of a giant test. Alright, the latter was probably only me, but it was still nice to have everything finally over and done with. To celebrate, we all headed down to a small park near the school to hang out for the afternoon. I left a note for my mother and might-as-well-be-step-dad, and for once got picked up by Ethan, as there was no threat of getting caught.

"Hey!" I exclaimed excitedly as I got into his rather old, somewhat beat up truck. It was a hand-me-down, but its age and clunky-ness gave it a bit of charm. I quickly kissed him on the cheek and sat down in the middle seat, despite the fact that we were the only two in the car and one would normally sit one seat over. This was a totally different situation, of course.

"Hey, we're good to go?" he asked kindly. One of my favourite things about Ethan was that he was always genuinely kind and caring, especially towards me.

"Yes. I left a note for my parents, so as long as we don't stay out too late, we're in the clear," I replied, my head already resting in its regular spot on Ethan's shoulder.

"Great. We'll probably be back before they're even home, these fake celebrations at the park are always kind of lame," Ethan said with a bit of a humourless laugh.

"It will be fun! I'm here this time, which automatically means it will be fabulous, right?" I giggled, not even trying to maintain a sarcastic tone.

"You do make everything much more tolerable." Butterflies jumped through my stomach for probably the billionth time, but I still wasn't tired of them.

I have to admit, Ethan was pretty right about our celebration being a tad lame. It was kind of just a glorified lunch break, without the whole lunch and being at school part. It was still fun because I was with him though, obviously. We had all been lying on the grass for what only felt like a half hour or so, but in reality it had been a few hours of talking about practically nothing and laughing at the stupidest of things. Sure, it wasn't all that exciting, but just being able to be comfortable around people I loved being around made me really happy.

"So, guys, I'm having a party tonight, and I want you all there, alright?" Erin, a tall, blonde senior who even Jeanette found intimidating at times, loudly proclaimed. There was a bit of collective cheering, but I internally panicked a little. I had never been to a proper high school party, and all I had heard about since I could remember from my parents was how I should avoid them at all costs. It couldn't be that bad though, right? It was going to be just my friends, mostly, and of course Ethan would be there.

"Morgan, don't act all innocent, you're going," Jeanette chirped in my direction. I smiled a little bit, the feeling of apprehension spreading through my mind.

"Yeah, of course, it will be fun," I agreed, pretending it was no big deal. Ethan wrapped his arm around my waist and looked at me.

"We don't have to go if you don't want, we can hang out at my house tonight," he suggested. I looked back and shook my head.

"No, it's fine, we'll have a good time," I responded quickly. I could tell he was a bit relieved, which made me feel a bit more confident about my decision; it's not like I wanted to ruin the night or anything.

"We'll be there," Ethan said happily to Erin, and there was a bit more cheering from everyone. I took a small deep breath, it's not like anything could go too terribly wrong, right?

Before the party, which was starting shortly after Erin's parents left their house at five, I was at Jeanette's house with a couple of the other girls. They insisted that I should borrow clothes from them, and this girl, Kayleigh, offered to do my makeup.

"You're not nervous, are you, Morgan?" Jeanette asked, sounding slightly passive-aggressive. We were all in her room, sitting on her bed, while Kayleigh spread some overly-dark and sparkly eye shadow on my eyelids. I was already wearing a rather loose tank top that was probably going to slip off my chest at some inopportune point during the night, and a pair of Jeanette's shorts that were even tinier than the ones I often chose to wear in the summer.

"No!" I dismissed the accusation quickly; I was the newest person in this group, and I didn't want to suddenly be not as fun as everyone else.

"Good, it's not like anything that bad will happen," Jeanette responded happily. The other girls agreed whole-heartedly, but they didn't have me convinced.

"Have you ever gotten drunk before?" Kayleigh asked, starting to touch up my eyeliner. My stomach dropped a little bit; sure, I assumed people were going to be drinking at the party, but I didn't think anyone was going to ask me about it.

"No…" I said, trailing off and electing to not elaborate. I had never even had an opportunity to have a sip of alcohol before, let alone get drunk.

"Oh, well, we'll help you out, then," Marie, one of the quieter girls, happily added. I had assumed that Jeanette was a likely candidate for having gotten drunk before, but the two others were a bit surprising to me.

"This is going to be so fun! I'm excited," Jeanette said, smiling at me. I gave her a half-smile back.

"…Yeah!" I agreed. This was probably going to be a rather anxiety-inducing night for me. I knew I wasn't supposed to give into peer pressure before it was even that prevalent, but the need to want everyone to like me was already too strong to disagree with my friends.

At first glance, the party seemed much tamer than I expected, which made me relax a bit. It was a bit far from my house, probably about a forty-five minute walk, but if I desperately needed to get home, it would have to do. I walked up the path behind Jeanette, feeling my nerves increase a little with every step. We eventually reached the door, and Jeanette elected to just open it without going to the trouble of knocking.

"Hey, guys!" Erin yelled excitedly, coming up to hug us all individually. I could smell an almost chemical scent radiating from her as she spoke. There was music playing in the background, and I could hear people talking noisily.

"Everyone's in there," Erin said, loosely pointing to a living room-looking area, "and there are drinks in the kitchen." I followed Kayleigh and Marie to sit down, my eyes scanning the room for Ethan. He wasn't there yet, but there still weren't many people around since it was early.

Shortly after sitting down, Jeanette came over to us with one of those signature red cups in either hand, and hurriedly handed one to me. I took it, unsure of exactly how to proceed.

"You couldn't get us anything?" Marie asked with the slightest of laughs.

"I'm only helping Morgan out tonight, or she'll be lost. And I only have two hands, so do it yourself," Jeanette snapped back, gesturing towards the kitchen. Marie begrudgingly got up; wandering in the direction Jeanette just came from.

"What is this?" I asked as Jeanette sat down beside me. She had the smallest of eye rolls that I bet she thought I didn't notice.

"It's good. Just drink it." I provided her with a wary expression. "Morgan, I'm your friend, it's not like I'm trying to drug you or something," she added. I gave her a sideways glance, but then decided to go against my better judgment and drink whatever concoction she had given me. It tasted kind of sharp, but kind of fruity at the same time. There was a sort of burn developing as it travelled through my system. It was weird.

"See? We didn't kill you," Kayleigh grinned at me. I laughed a little, electing to take another sip, as it probably got less sharp as I got more used to it.

"Yet," I added, laughing. Everyone, including Marie, who had just returned with drinks for her and Kayleigh, laughed along with me. Maybe this wouldn't be such a scary night after all.

As the time flew by, and Jeanette refilled whatever substance was in the cup I was holding, the night got more and more fun. My head was feeling a little fuzzy, but it was a good fuzzy, if that makes sense (it made sense at the time). Everything was so much funnier, and it was probably just because I was letting myself have fun, not because of the alcohol.

"You okay, Morgan?" Kayleigh asked. I attempted to focus my eyes solely on her, but everything else was just so intriguing.

"Yee-ah!" I replied, giggling. All of my friends shared knowing glances, and I looked at all of them, confused.

"How are you so drunk already? You've barely had two drinks," Jeanette asked, laughing. I looked at her, confused.

"I'm not drunk!" I exclaimed, laughing at how loud I had said that. "Where's Ethan?" I added, scanning the room again. It had been at least an hour, and he was still nowhere to be seen.

"I haven't seen him; do you want me to call him?" Marie asked. I nodded with what was probably the goofiest grin ever on my face. I watched her intently while I rested my head on whoever's shoulder was beside me, giggling some more. She dialled the number and brought it to her ear.

"Hey, so your girlfriend is just a little drunk, to say the least, where are you?" Marie asked, laughing a little as my eyes lit up when I realized he was on the phone with her.

"Tell him I say hi!" I yelled, once again louder than I expected.

"In case you're deaf and couldn't hear that, she says hi," Marie said. "…He says hi." I laughed.

"That's SO cool!" I yelled yet again, and everyone laughed. I wasn't entirely sure what was so funny, but I joined in nevertheless. Jeanette plucked the almost empty cup out of my hand as she got up to head back to the kitchen.

"He'll be here in a couple minutes," Marie said, and I grinned.

"That… is awesome," I said with utmost sincerity. Jeanette handed me my cup back again.

"Just because you're not already intoxicated or anything," she said, laughing as I sniffed it.

"It smells like fruit!" I concluded with a smile. "Thank you!" I gave her an awkward, one armed hug. She laughed again.

"You're so funny. Why have we never done this before?" she asked to everyone, and they all shrugged and continued to giggle. I wondered why nobody was as excited to be at the party as I was; usually I was one of the quieter friends. I was still sure it had nothing to do with the alcohol. I thought I was being reasonably careful. It was just because I was in an unusually giggly mood, right?

Just as my eyes, that were starting to feel only a tad heavy, were slowly looking around for my boyfriend, I saw him enter the room. I grinned and leapt out of my seat with a severe lack of grace. Everyone continued to laugh at my expense, not that I cared at this point, as I briefly stumbled while walking quickly over to Ethan.

"Heeey!" I said, standing on my tiptoes to kiss his cheek and then nearly falling onto him. I snickered as I struggled to regain my balance, with his help, and made sure I didn't lose any of my drink in the process. That was important.

"Hey, Morg, you feeling okay?" I snorted with laughter at the fact that this was the second time I had been asked that question in a short period of time, yet I was absolutely fine. I felt great; I didn't even understand why I had thought this party wasn't a good idea when the concept was first brought up.

"I feel great!" I exclaimed as he wrapped one arm around my waist, partly affectionately, but also to make sure I didn't fall. "Hey!" I called to a couple other guys. Realizing I didn't even know them, I started cackling as if it were the funniest thing in the world.

"Wow, Marie was right, you really are drunk," Ethan commented, walking over with me to claim a seat on one of the couches by Jeanette and company. "I'll be back in one second, okay? I'm just going to get a drink." I nodded and sat back down, pointing out how Ethan was here to my friends. They grinned and agreed that yes, he was, in fact, present.

Ethan came back almost right away and sat down next to me on the couch. I promptly maneuvered myself so I was sitting on his lap, as I had a very prominent need for human contact that night.

"How many drinks have you had?" he asked me, tracing a random pattern on my knee. I giggled.

"I don't know! I'm not drunk though," I responded happily. Practically everyone within hearing distance burst into hysterical laughter. I looked around at them, confused, but happy that everyone thought whatever I had said was humorous.

"Morg, trust me, you're drunk," Ethan said, also laughing with everyone. I shook my head with a lopsided grin. Deep down, I knew I was, but denying the fact made the voice in my head telling me how stupid of an idea this was a bit quieter.

Since I was feeling so confident and out there, I suddenly leaned down to kiss Ethan, and continued to do so for many minutes longer than I would have in a public setting if I was sober. Looking back, it was probably uncomfortable for everyone else in the room, which makes it a rather embarrassing moment to look back on when I start reminiscing about the past. Finally, Jeanette decided to try and break the awkwardness that Ethan and I were totally unaware of by yelling at us to get a room. I pulled away from his lips and laughed, suddenly realizing where I was.

"I say it with a bit of love, but mostly just because nobody is going to need the added nausea from you two playing tonsil hockey in a few hours," Jeanette commented, warranting a few mumblings of agreement from the rest of the room.

"You're just jealous!" I yelled back, still laughing. I didn't understand why my brain feeling a little fuzzy made everything so much funnier, but I don't think I was complaining.

"I'm definitely not," she replied, raising an eyebrow. I raised an eyebrow back, but couldn't maintain it for long before I was grinning again.

"Who let you have so much to drink?" Ethan inquired. I loosely raised an arm and pointed towards Jeanette, who was too caught up in whatever she found so hilarious at that moment to notice. He looked over, sighed, but still continued to laugh at the random mess of sentences that were spilling out of my mouth.

What must have been a few hours later, I was still on the couch, but Ethan had left the room not that long ago. He didn't specify what for as I recall, but I was having a blast talking to some of the new people my friends had introduced me to. I had stopped drinking, as I was willing to admit that I had probably had way too much for someone who had never had a sip of alcohol before, but I was still feeling like I was floating. Small waves of nausea occasionally overtook me for brief moments at a time, but I ignored them. Aware that I was going to feel absolutely dreadful in the morning, I decided to not waste my mood on dwelling on how I maybe should have thought everything through a little more.

"Where's the bathroom?" I asked to no one in particular, the room suddenly feeling like it was spinning.

"Down the hall, second door on the right I believe," Kayleigh replied. I took a deep breath, telling myself that I was just having a moment, and stood up, still stumbling a little.

"You okay?" Marie asked. I nodded.

"I'm fine," I responded, dismissing the notion that there could possibly be anything wrong. I wandered down towards the hallway, being extra careful not to fall, despite how funny I would probably find that. I willed my brain to let me focus on numbers so I could count the doors, and found the second door. I twisted the handle and pushed it open, quickly realizing that I had found a bedroom, not a restroom. The couple that had been making out on the bed stopped and looked up.

"S-sorry, wrong room," I said quickly, before realizing who I was speaking to. "Ethan?" I asked loudly, unable to comprehend that it was him. I continued staring at him for a few moments longer while whatever girl he was with fled the room, and my intoxicated brain confirmed it was him.

"Morgan, I'm sorry," he said, rushing over to me. I took a step back, suddenly feeling a little more aware of my surroundings. This couldn't be happening right now. Had I fallen asleep in my drunken haze and started having a nightmare?

"No, I don't think you get to be sorry. What the hell were you doing?" I yelled, fully aware of what he had been doing, but I still asked even though I didn't really want him to try and justify it.

"I'm sorry, okay, things just got out of hand," he said quickly, as if he had rehearsed his lines beforehand.

"Just got out of hand? What, did you forget that I exist? I've been in the same house as you this whole time! Did you just conveniently forget that?" I spat back at him, feeling tears stinging the back of my eyes. I wasn't going to cry. I couldn't let myself do that.

"You're so drunk, Morgan, I didn't want to take advantage of you. Doesn't that make it a little bit better?" he asked, a humourless laugh escaping his mouth. I stared at him while a beat of conversation passed, disgusted.

"No, it does not make it better. You couldn't go a few hours without trying to mess around with some girl you probably don't even know? That's supposed to make me feel happy because you didn't want to take advantage of me? Well, thanks, that's great. Glad you were thinking of me," I shot back at him. He sighed, and I wondered what made him think he had to right to be annoyed with me.

"Does it help that I'm really sorry? And it's because I'm drunk? And it won't happen again?" he asked, trying to wrap his arms around me. He had the same near chemical smell that I had smelled on Erin's breath earlier, which made him even more off-putting to be close to, even though I probably had a similar aura to me. I pushed him back forcefully, wanting him to stay far away from me.

"Don't touch me!" I said angrily, trying to forget about the tears that were threatening to fall.

"Morgan, come on. I promise it won't happen again," he said, this time raising his voice. I flinched a little, but kept my composure. I looked down to the ground for a moment to give myself a short amount of time to arrange my thoughts in my head. The alcohol was not helping this situation, but at least I wasn't laughing anymore.

"Yeah, you're right, it won't happen again. We're over. I can't do this," I said in a low voice, turning around and exiting the room. Feeling like I just wanted to huddle myself in the corner and never get up again, I hurried to the door and left before anyone could see me. I was never going to live this down.

Though I realized it was going to be a long walk, especially in the dark when I was still drunk, I had no one to call to help me. I just couldn't call my parents; it would be humiliating and I would receive the world's longest lecture. They were probably already wondering where I was, but they would just have to wait to see me in the morning. I wasn't going to let them see me like this.

As I reached the road and headed in the direction towards my house, I finally let my tears fall. My vision almost immediately blurred, and I swear my heart felt like it had a crack in it. The volume of my crying increased rapidly, to the point where I worried someone was going to hear me and try to figure out what was going on. I wanted to stop and let myself have a moment to let my thoughts run through my head, but it would only make my journey longer, so I kept going. I was hardly walking straight as the sobs wracked my body, and the feeling of wanting to throw up was prominent in the back of my throat. I think this was from my overconsumption of alcohol, but also because of the scene I just witnessed. I had loved Ethan, or at least I truly thought I had before, and seeing that felt like someone had repeatedly stomped on my heart.

Finally, what felt like hours later, I reached my house. I prayed the door would be unlocked, and it was, so I let myself into the dark foyer and tried to muffle my crying by putting my hand over my mouth. This was also to try and prevent myself from puking in the hallway, which would only make everything more difficult to explain. I kicked my shoes off and ran upstairs to the bathroom, taking the extra moment to lock the door before I lost the contents of my stomach in the toilet, still crying. I had to hold my hair back myself, which made me feel more alone. Eventually, I managed to get myself up off the floor, and I looked at myself in the mirror. There was black mascara and eyeliner filling up my cheeks with ugly tear streaked lines, and I tried to brush them away, but they only spread. This only made me cry more, and I finally gave myself that moment to process what had happened. I sobbed heavy, gut-wrenching sobs, my whole body shaking, and I forgot that I was supposed to be being quiet.

"You're going to be okay," I whispered to myself with a very shaky voice while staring at my reflection. Of course, I felt like this wasn't true, and I would forever be plagued with this heartache, but I had to try and tell myself that.

"Morgan?" I heard my mother's voice from outside the door. My stomach dropped.

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_So the end was not so enjoyable to write, but the rest was lots of fun. :) I hope you enjoyed Morgan's emotional roller coaster, and please leave a review if you would like :) _


	9. IX

_This chapter is a bit angst-y with a bit of happiness in the middle. Haha. Enjoy! Thank you for your continued interest in my story._

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**IX**

After hearing my mother's voice on the other side of the door, the feeling of panic quickly spread through my body. I wiped my face on the small face cloth that was in front of me, trying to diminish the evidence of my tears, but it was a frivolous attempt; this amount of crying was nearly impossible to hide. I checked my reflection again, and immediately chastised myself for choosing to borrow clothes from Jeanette. The revealing tank top alone would probably give my mother a heart attack.

"Morgan? Are you okay?" my mother asked, sounding very concerned. If she was really that concerned, she should have been worried when I still wasn't home at whatever hour it currently was.

"I'm fine," I dismissed immediately, trying to sound like I was. I probably wasn't that convincing, but it was worth a shot.

"Did you just get home? Where were you?" she questioned, this time opening the door. My stomach dropped again. What was I supposed to do?

"I was out, it's nothing," I responded, trying to get past her to get to my room where I could pull my blankets over my head and sob.

"It doesn't look like nothing, sweetie. What are you wearing?" This time, she sounded more annoyed than anything as she finished her thought. I tried to subtly roll my eyes.

"What? Nothing," I replied, using my go to response when I didn't want to speak with her anymore.

"Well, yeah, I can tell it's nothing. What were you doing when you were 'out'?" she asked, using air quotations. I had no idea how to answer. Honestly, I was surprised that she hadn't figured it out already; my breath probably smelled strongly of alcohol.

"Mom, nothing, please just let me to go to sleep. Please," I pleaded, once again trying to get past her. She stepped in front of me, analyzing my face.

"If it was 'nothing', then why have you been crying? And why do you absolutely reek of alcohol?" Shoot, she could tell. I guess anyone with a sense of smell probably could. I felt tears well to my eyes again as I recalled the situation that had happen not too long ago.

"Please stop," I begged again, trying to keep myself from crying in front of her. Ever since the lead up to my parents' divorce, I had prided myself in never crying in front of either of them. It was my form of controlling what was happening, as stupid as that was.

"So you got incredibly drunk with all your friends without telling anyone where you were, and then something seemingly traumatizing happens, but you refuse to tell me?" she snapped, finally losing her patience. I took yet another shaky breath and tried to convince my brain to allow me to think about what to say next.

"I, just, I don't know, okay?" I snapped back, not sure how to finish my reply.

"Did something happen with a boy of some sort?" my mother said, closing her eyes for a moment, probably hoping there would be a negative response. I felt my tears threaten to overflow, so I merely tried to shake my head, but could barely even manage that. "Morgan…"

"Yes, okay. Yes! Are you happy now?" I yelled, tears slipping down my face. I wiped them away as if they were drops of acid burning through my skin.

"Of course I'm not happy, Morgan. Did someone hurt you?" she asked, holding my arm and sounding concerned again.

"I don't want to talk about it, okay? Can I please just go to my room?" I shot back, feeling desperate to get out of the situation. She shook her head, probably unsure of how to react as well.

"Fine, but we're talking about this tomorrow. I'm not ignoring the fact that you came home looking like a stripper and smelling like an alcoholic." I immediately pushed past her to my room, slamming the door behind me. Not even bothering to change out of Jeanette's clothes, I threw myself on the bed and under the covers, and immediately resumed crying. I put one of my blankets over my mouth, muffling the sobbing, and closed my eyes as if that would transport me away into a universe where none of this had ever happened.

After what must have been at least an hour of attempting to sleep through my own crying, I was lost as to what to do. I wasn't going to go crying to my mother. I had kind of burned that bridge; she probably wouldn't be too interested in being nice to me right now. It's not like I could call any of my friends; they were probably still drinking, and they probably hadn't even noticed I had fled the scene. I could only think of one possible person I could talk to.

"Catherine," I whispered to myself. Sure, it's not like we were related, or even overly close, but she had said in a recent email to me that I could call her anytime I wanted if I ever needed anything, or just needed to talk. I had never taken anyone up on an offer like that, but I was a little desperate and I still wasn't thinking clearly. I sat up in my bed and pulled my phone out of my pocket, quickly realizing that even though she worked the night shift and would still be reachable at this hour, I didn't have a way to actually contact her. I sighed internally, wiping another tear from my puffy eyes. Quickly deciding to just use the general number for the crime lab to attempt to reach her through there, I went through the contacts on my phone to find the number.

As I dialled, I crossed my fingers on my other hand that my dad wouldn't answer. It was unlikely, he probably wasn't even there, but you never know. Lifting the phone to my ear, my heart started to pound like it always did when I had to call someone, regardless of whether I wanted to or not. It rang once, and then twice, and then someone picked up. I had another moment of extreme worry while waiting for the person to say something.

"Las Vegas Crime Lab, how may I help you?" It was a secretary of some sort. That was a big relief.

"Hi, can I please speak to Catherine Willows?" I asked, my voice sounding considerably weak to me.

"May I tell her who is calling?" the secretary asked. This worried me a little; was she still going to let me talk to her even though this was a weird personal call?

"Just…just say it's Morgan," I said as another tear fell.

"Okay, hold on, I'll transfer you to her office." I immediately gave her a small thank you, feeling like an idiot for crying while talking to a stranger on the phone, even though I knew they couldn't see me. The brief few moments felt like an eternity, and I wiped my eyes for what was probably the billionth time.

"Morgan? Are you okay?" Catherine asked, sounding worried. I didn't really know what to say, even though I was the one who had made the call. Just hearing someone who didn't really know me ask if I was okay gave me a small sense of satisfaction.

"No," I said, my voice sounding even smaller than it did minutes earlier. I took a deep breath, trying to inhale without making a noise associated with the utter sobbing that had been occurring.

"What happened? Talk to me," she asked, not sounding impatient or rude like any other adult in my life would have sounded. I took another breath, this one sounding harsher than the last one, and mustered up some courage so I could actually speak.

"He… He cheated on me," I said, silent, salty tears streaming down my face. My eyes stung, but it's not like I could do anything about that.

"Ethan? Sweetie, I'm sorry," Catherine responded, and I nodded, barely realizing that she couldn't see me.

"Yes," I said in a barely audible tone. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have called. I just… I just didn't know what to do." This time, the sobbing resumed, and I hardly tried to stop it.

"Morgan, do not be sorry. I totally understand. Why don't you tell me what happened? Take as much time as you need," she spoke slowly, probably trying to make me let myself calm down. I drew in a couple more sharp breaths, and started to attempt to recall the events from the beginning. Some things were a little unclear, and they were probably explained as such, but it's not like I had much chance of making sense, between my sadness and all of the drinking. Saying everything out loud was making it seem all the more real, and I'm not sure if that made it better or worse. It was better, in a way, because it assured me that I was not in a nightmare, but worse at the same time, because I wished I was in one.

"Please don't tell my dad," I begged as I ended my story. I lifted a blanket from my lap and tried to dry my face a little, the once pink blanket coming away with deep black smudges covering it. I could even tell when I was sitting here in the dark.

"All of this will stay between us, I promise," she assured me. A small, yet tearful, smile formed on my lips. "I'm so sorry to hear all of this, Morgan. I know you're not going to believe me, but you're going to be okay. I swear. I went through a similar experience when I was around the same age as you, and I know this doesn't make it any better, but I felt the same way. You're going to feel like crap for a bit, and honestly, it's going to suck. But that's okay, because eventually you'll start to feel better, and then all that will cross your mind when you look back is how stupid Ethan was to let you go. That sounds cheesy, doesn't it?"

"No," I confirmed, truly appreciating every word she said. She gave me a small laugh, and if the circumstances were any different, I would have joined.

"Alright, good. And Morgan, this situation was completely out of your control. I know there's nothing you could have done. He wanted to be a jerk, and he was, and you couldn't have changed that. He'll pay for it one day. But don't doubt what you did, because there isn't anything you can do now. You're probably running all the variables through your mind right now, but it will only make you feel worse. Try not to be too regretful," she explained.

"It was so stupid of me, though. I should have never gone in the first place," I cried, still feeling like an idiot even though I was trying not to.

"You did the same thing almost every single teenaged girl would do if they were placed in that situation. You felt the pressure to drink like everyone else, and you gave in, and that's okay. We all have to do that a few times to get it out of our system. It will only make you more assertive in the long run, because you know what the other side feels like. Everyone goes to parties and does something stupid, and you know what? You didn't even do anything stupid, or that's what it sounds like. Don't blame yourself," Catherine replied, making me feel just a little bit better, if that was possible.

"Thank you. I can't really put into words how grateful I am right now, but I owe you," I said, a humourless laugh filling my voice.

"It's absolutely no problem. I'm glad I could help, and I'm glad you called, because dwelling on it by yourself isn't going to help you. You can call anytime, okay?" she said. I gave a sigh of relief; even if I was causing a headache, at least Catherine made me feel like I was totally in the right.

Thank you. I will. And Catherine?" I said, having one more piece to express my gratitude for.

"Yeah?"

"Thank you for not lecturing me on underage drinking. I know I'm going to get that from my mother, and I know it was wrong, but I don't like hearing from other people how idiotic it was when I already know for myself," I said as I saw a few more drops fall off my cheeks onto my bed.

"No problem, I understand. As long as you know for yourself that you might not want to make the decisions you did all that often, it's fine. And it's not my job anyway. My job is just to be cool, right?" she joked, and I gave a small laugh.

"Yeah, and you definitely accomplished that. Thank you again," I said sincerely, closing my eyes.

"Thank you for calling. I'm glad I could help you talk about it. Call me again soon, or email, alright?"

"Of course. Goodnight," I said.

"Goodnight, Morgan."

I took a sigh of relief, feeling a little less stress now that I had gotten my story off of my chest to someone who was willing to listen without judgment. I still felt horrible, and I thought it was impossible that I would feel better anytime soon, but at least there was a small beacon of hope after the conversation I had just been a part of. I lay back down, pulling the covers over my head to feel safer. I looked at the time on my phone before putting it on my bedside table. It was 3:30, which made me really hope that my mom would wait until a decent hour before waking me up to yell at me. I rolled onto my side and decided to go into the long battle that was trying to sleep while I was still upset. The tears continued to pour out of my eyes as if I was some sort of human fountain, and touching my cheeks to try and keep them dry made them sting and burn. I was fairly certain I had never cried so much or so hard in my life, even when my dad had told me that he and my mother were finally separating. That had barely sparked any tears, or at least not until way later when I was in my room with the blankets over my head to muffle the noise of fighting from downstairs. All of this was only going to make me stronger, right?

Eventually, I had succumb to sleep, and even though I kept waking up, either from a sudden remembrance of what had occurred only hours earlier, or from the pounding in my head that was only becoming more and more prominent. In the reasonably early hours of the morning, I gave up on trying to get back to sleep. I felt overly nauseated, and my headache was alarmingly awful. In an attempt to keep my mom from coming in and reading me the riot act, I tried to keep as quiet as possible. I knew that she would inevitably come in, not caring if I was asleep or not, but trying to control the volume of my continued sobbing made me feel in control.

"Morgan?" she asked, and I groaned internally. I lifted my head up as I pulled the covers back, looking at her with a clear look of annoyance. She had a glass of water in one hand, and two white capsules in the other.

"What?" I asked, exasperated already. She handed me both the capsules and the glass of water.

"Here, it will make you feel better," she explained. I swallowed the pills, one at a time, the feeling of them slipping down my throat making me feel like I needed to throw up again.

"Probably not, but thanks," I mumbled, keeping my eyes away from hers.

"Alright, Morgan, what happened last night? You have to tell me, so start talking," she said, no kindness in her tone.

"I got drunk, and then I don't know." I knew this would not convince her in the slightest, but it was worth a try.

"I know you remembered what happened, Morgan! You were pretty shaken up about it, to say the least, last night. What happened with the boy that I know was involved?" she asked. I sighed.

"Fine, fine, I'll tell you. I had a boyfriend, and last night, when we were at the party, he... He cheated on me while I was there and I saw," I said quickly, covering my face a little.

"You had a boyfriend and didn't tell me. Well, anyway, what was his name?" she asked. I glared at her. Did that really matter right now?

"Ethan. His name was Ethan, since that's obviously the important part right now," I replied, my usual snarky undertone still intact.

"Morgan," she said with a warning tone. "Alright, well you obviously don't want to talk about it, so I'll leave that there. As to the part about you wearing some of the worst excuses for pieces of clothing I've ever seen and then proceeding to get extremely drunk with all of your friends, you're grounded for two weeks, and I'm taking your phone away for a week. Deal?" There was obviously no room for negotiation, so her last word was only uttered to be obnoxious.

"Fine, as if I'm not as miserable enough as it is! Do you really think I plan on going out again anytime soon? I've pretty much lost all of my friends now, and I feel like I just got hit by a bus, both mentally and physically. So thanks a lot for all of your care and concern!" I snapped, looking away from her with tears in my eyes.

"Morgan, honey, come on. You know what you did was wrong, and I'm sorry for what happened last night, but I can't just ignore what you did. Be a little more mature," she said, anger seeping into her tone.

"Fine. Whatever," I mumbled, and with that, she left, my phone in her hand.

Would it be considered to be socially acceptable to just never leave my room again? That's what I felt like doing, and it's not like anyone would notice or care if I just wasn't really around anymore.

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_I hope that wasn't too much of a downer chapter...haha. And even though none of this is canon and I wrote it myself, I love Catherine even more after this chapter. :) Hehe. Hope you enjoyed! _


	10. X

_Sorry I haven't updated in a few days, I have had this chapter written for awhile but fanfiction hasn't been letting me update! Thanks for reading and hope you enjoy! _

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**X**

I knew going to school a few days after the party would be difficult. I had gone through every possibility and variable in my mind, over and over again, and I was thoroughly worried. At least it was the new semester; something I had been dreading with every fibre of my being for the past three months was now being heavily celebrated as I lay in bed every night. The past few days had me emotionally drained, and trying to mask the dark circles under my eyes coupled with the puffiness surrounding them was going to be hard. Keeping my composure at school was also going to be a majorly challenging factor, and I was fully aware that I would probably have to take several moments to calm myself down at some point, probably in a bathroom stall where I would hope that nobody would hear me crying. The whole idea of having to leave my room for more than six hours made me sick, especially when I was going to be stuck in a building with some of the people I had no intention of being around ever again.

I had decided that I wasn't going to be one of those girls who forgives their ex-boyfriend in an effort to not lose the associated friendships. Honestly, after three and a half months, there was no extreme emotional attachment to any of them. There was, of course, the emotional attachment to Ethan, but that ship had sailed, and I wouldn't be returning to thinking he was the greatest human being on Earth at any point in the future. Sure, I was friends with Jeanette and most of the other girls, even though I hadn't been all that close with them, but I was more than willing to sacrifice all of that to avoid being around the boy who had completely shattered my heart. I should have known not to let myself get so invested in my relationship, because he was obviously lying when he had told me he loved me. On so many different occasions, he had spoken those three little words, and every time I fell for it. I firmly believed that I was the most naïve person to ever grace the earth, even though it was probably a common occurrence in many high school relationships.

My parents had not offered much support, but that was partly my fault. It was a rare thing for me to let somebody into my life in an attempt to talk about my problems or how to fix them, so I always made myself as distant as I could. Of course, Catherine was the exception to my rule, but there wasn't anyone else who had the right to hear about my distress. Both my mom and my basically-step-dad had tried to talk to me and offered me a shoulder to cry on, but I had refused, saying that I was fine. Everyone knew I wasn't fine, including myself, but if I said it enough it was bound to come true, right?

My first two classes had been uneventful; just the usual introductions to the course that I had learned to love. These intros always took almost the entire class, meaning I had an excuse to not speak with anyone for an elongated period of time. Trying to make friends was difficult, especially when I still felt like I had just been hit with a ton of bricks. While I was thankful for my new teachers taking their time discussing everything about their class, I was more thankful for the fact that none of my previous friends were in my classes. Almost everyone in that group was a junior, or even a senior, so there was little chance, but there was always that chance that one of the few other sophomores would pop up somewhere. It would have been awkward, obviously, especially when I didn't even know if they knew about what had happened at the party. I wouldn't be surprised if they had absolutely no idea, which would only make my life more miserable when I inevitably ended up talking to one of them and having to explain the whole situation. Having said that, almost every part of my life was awkward, and even though I had received a brief break from that gift while I was dating Ethan, it was back now, probably stronger than ever. I guess that everything that could possibly be positive had to come to an end for me.

What had previously been my favourite part of the day quickly returned to being my least favourite part. Having to eat lunch without anyone to hang out with was one of the most embarrassing situations I had ever managed to get myself in to. Sitting outside my locker, completely alone, was humiliating, and even though not many people walked by, it felt like the whole school was staring. I still didn't have my phone back, so I couldn't pretend to be socializing with someone, therefore it was just me. Trying to avoid looking up, I doodled in one of my notebooks to look like I was totally content.

"Morgan?" My head immediately shot up when I heard Jeanette's voice, judgment prevalent in her tone. I scrambled to my feet, turning around to put the bag I had put my lunch in back into my locker. I looked back at her with a small, but not overly-friendly, smile.

"Hey," I said passively. I felt like she was over-analyzing every part of me, and I was probably right. I absent-mindedly brushed some loose hair off my face and tried to be a bit less self-aware, as hard as that was for me.

"Where have you been? What happened to you on Thursday? I've called you, but you've been ignoring my calls," she explained. I felt dread occupy my mind; she probably had no idea what happened.

"Uh, sorry, my mom has my phone, so I haven't been ignoring you. Um, didn't Ethan tell you guys what happened?" I asked, trying to sound like it was no big deal. In reality, there were tears threatening to fall, and I was doing everything in my power to prevent them from doing so.

"Well, yeah, but we didn't really expect you to completely fall off the radar. Why aren't you eating lunch with us?" she responded, also sounding like it was no big deal, but she wasn't pretending. I closed my locker and turned to look at her.

"To be honest, I don't really want to be around him," I said quietly. She almost looked stunned, and I was mystified as to why this conversation seemed to be one big point of confusion for her.

"Morgan, it's not like we're forcing you to kiss and make-up. You can still hang out with us. You guys can just be friends, right?" she said, an almost sweet undertone occupying her voice.

"Honestly, Jeanette, I don't ever want to see Ethan again, let alone be friends with him," I said, this time a bit more assertion in my voice.

"Seriously? You haven't even talked to him about it. It was a mistake," she snapped back, also sounding a bit meaner. What I was hearing completely shocked me; wasn't Jeanette supposed to be taking my side due to Ethan being a total jerk?

"I think I've talked to him enough already, thanks. Maybe you don't agree, but I don't there should be any expectation that I should forgive him, regardless of whether or not it was a mistake," I shot back at her, suddenly feeling more and more confident with every word. My hands were shaking a bit, but I ignored it, and hoped she didn't notice.

"Jeez, relax. Stuff like that happens all the time. If you had stuck around, you probably would have done the same thing with one of the guys you were talking to. Everyone was drunk, and I think it's kind of hypocritical that you're blaming him for something he did when he was drunk, when you were the drunkest one there by far." I felt the shaking in my hands increase, and I wanted to scream. Did she even hear what she was saying?

"You know what? Sure, I was really drunk, but you have no right to assume that I would have done the same thing, because I wouldn't have. I would never do that. Just because Ethan would, and I'm assuming you would, too, does not mean I would ever cheat. Blaming him for making out with another girl while we were both drunk is not hypocritical, Jeanette, and it's stupid of you to think that," I said angrily. I think she was a little surprised someone was standing up to her; that rarely happened.

"I think it's stupid of you to just write us all off because of one little thing that happened! I'm surprised you can even remember," she replied.

"It's not a little thing! Just because you don't think it's a big deal doesn't mean it doesn't matter to me. You have no right to be acting like I'm in the wrong," I said as she rolled her eyes.

"Whatever, Morgan, but don't try running back to us when you feel lonely and can't find any friends, which is what's going to happen. None of us want to hang out with you if you're going to blow everything out of proportion and make Ethan feel even worse," Jeanette said, starting to walk away.

"You know what? I don't need you guys to be happy, despite what you think, and I had no plans on ever going back to you guys again. I don't want to be around people who make me feel stupid for my own decisions that are completely justified." With that, she was gone, and I felt angrier than ever. I debated going after her to further explain how much of an idiot she was for having such a deluded sense of right and wrong, but I decided to just leave it. If she wanted to continue being ignorant, as much as it would forever annoy me deep down, I had to just accept it, or at least try to. Surely, some of the other girls didn't feel the same way, not that I'd ever know.

When I got home that day, I immediately went to my room and resumed my usual hiding under the covers and trying not to cry. I had my laptop in front of me, so I decided to write a quick email to Catherine to let her know of my truly horrendous day. Yes, the classes were fine, but the conversation I had to endure at lunch ruined any chance I had of feeling like my state of mind was improving. Jeanette had been essentially telling me how wrong it was of me to have feelings, which I may have brushed off at the time, but it really did get to me. My feelings were justified, or at least I had thought so. Of course they were. I had to stop letting other people's opinions control me so much, because I knew they didn't matter. I had always known that, but sometimes applying the fact to my everyday life was much easier said than done.

Despite what Jeanette said, I was probably going to be able to find new friends, right? It's not like they were the rulers of the school; and there were tons of other kids. I was going to be just fine, or at least I hoped so. I've always liked to think that time heals all, and this was just another test of this theory. Maybe the best was yet to come.

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_Okay, so I absolutely love when Morgan is all assertive and tough on CSI, so I was dying to write the beginnings of her developing that side of her personality. Next chapter focuses more on Morgan's relationship with her dad :) My updates may start getting a little few and far between soon; I've got 3 exams coming up in the next couple of weeks and I'm going to try and focus on studying as much as I don't want to. Haha. _


	11. XI

**XI**

After close to two months of being away from all of my newly old friends and my now ex-boyfriend, I felt like I was finally over it all. Yes, it still hurt my heart to think about the events that occurred at the party, but I felt much better about myself than I previously had. I had to admit, I kind of missed hanging out with some of them at lunch, but I was confident that I had made the right decision in deciding to lose all contact with each one of them. Thankfully, very few awkward encounters with any of them had happened; seeing them in the hallways proved a little uncomfortable, but it was nothing I couldn't handle. Ethan had tried to talk to me early on, but I had informed him that I had no intention of ever speaking to him again, and he backed off. I kind of loved the new, assertive side of my personality.

Making new friends was difficult for me, but I was used to that, and I tried to work through it. I spent most of my time with some girls in my art class, and they were nice enough. They were kind of ditzy, which I pretended not to mind, but beggars can't really be choosers. At least they were nice and probably wouldn't support other people breaking my heart like my previous friends had. None of them were into partying or anything of the like, which made me breathe a sigh of relief. There was a slim to none chance of me ever attending a high school party again, and even though I was not going to give into the pressure like last time, saying no still would've been difficult for me. Sure, I had kind of found my voice in the past weeks, but I hadn't done a complete one-eighty. It was going to take me a long time to be able to not care at all what other people thought of me.

One thing I secretly enjoyed about having new friends was the fact that they didn't pester me too much. Spring Break was only a few days away, and I really just wanted to be alone. Sometimes I just needed some time to let my brain relax, because when I was around other people, I had what felt like billions of things running through my mind. Two weeks to myself was much anticipated and very much needed.

"Morgan, before you lock yourself in your room," I rolled my eyes at this, "I have to talk to you." I turned around and waited for my mother to speak. She was sitting on the couch with Jerry, and I knew something bad was going to come of it.

"What?" I asked as I sit down on one of the brown leather chairs, twiddling several strands of hair in between my fingers.

"So, I was talking to your father earlier, and we were discussing Spring Break…"

"No. I am not… No. I am not going there for my break! I've been looking forward to this, and I already told you that I'm not going back to Vegas again," I said, interrupting her. She sighed, as if she wasn't used to my quick reaction times.

"Just hear her out, Morg," Jerry said, trying to be the peacekeeper. I sighed.

"As I was saying, we were discussing Spring Break, and we decided that you're going to go visit for the second week. He told me that Catherine said you could spend a couple of the days that he is working with her," she explained, knowing that her last thought would make me a bit more accepting of the idea.

"Why can't I just stay here?" I whined. At this point, I knew trying to argue my way out of this would be a frivolous attempt, so I elected to resort to whining.

"Because you don't spend enough time with your dad. He misses you, Morgan, especially since you never call or make an effort to communicate with him. You're going, and you'll have a good time, alright?" Yeah, telling me that was really going to help.

"He doesn't miss me. He doesn't even care about me. If he cared, he wouldn't have sent me back here after the incident in the summer," I said. Even though I knew I couldn't get out of this trip, I needed to get my point across.

"Of course he cares about you. That was different, and you know that," my mother reasoned, and I rolled my eyes.

"It wasn't different at all! You don't even know what happened because you only listened to his warped view of what happened. If you listened to me, you wouldn't be sending me there," I replied bitterly.

"Morgan, honestly, stop being so dramatic. What's done is done. You're going, and somehow you're going to survive. You even get to spend time with someone else besides your father, so the two of you won't kill each other." I scoffed; just because I got to see Catherine for a bit of my dreaded trip did not mean there was any less chance of homicide occurring in my father's apartment.

"Whatever," I breathed, heading up to my room. I had vowed to never see my dad again, and now this was happening?

The first week of the break flew by since I was enjoying my alone time so much, and the second week was only a couple days away. I was doing my best to put a positive spin on it, and I would never tell anyone this, but a small part of me was excited. Yes, I would have to make awkward conversation with my dad for hours at a time, but I was going to hang out with Catherine, and that was awesome. Despite the fact that I had only actually met her once, the rest of our communication occurred solely on the phone or over email, she was one of my favourite people in the world.

Growing up, I had never had much of a female role model to look up to. Yes, I had my mom, but since I was young, we had never really been that close, which was kind of frustrating. I'm sure lots of girls would kill to even have a mother, which made me feel bad about not getting along with mine, but there wasn't much I could do. We were always arguing over something, and we could never agree on even the simplest of things. Sometimes, we would get along perfectly fine, like we had always been close, but then the littlest thing would be blown out of proportion by both of us and it would be back to a strained relationship. Catherine seemed to understand everything I was going through, and she didn't judge me about it like my mom did. I had given up on confiding in my mother about various things when I was little, because she always had a differing opinion on it, or she would unintentionally make me feel bad about whatever my issue was. Catherine never did that; she always just listened and then gave me advice. We could also just talk, something I couldn't do with either of my parents. Somehow, the adult I wasn't related to was the only one I would actually open up to. Before I had started talking to her, there was nobody in my life that I would willingly discuss things that were bothering me with. I still was occasionally reluctant to bringing up issues with her, but at least I didn't have a reason for it.

While I was home alone, the phone rang, which was one of the things that I hated most in life. Answering the phone was terrifying, and if there was nobody around, I couldn't pass the responsibility onto someone else. I had to muster up every ounce of courage to pick up the ringing device every single time, and it never got any easier.

"Hello?" I said, praying it would be a telemarketer so I could just hang up.

"Hey, M, how are you?" Ugh, the worst variable of them all; my dad. I groaned internally, wishing I had never picked up.

"Fine. You?" I asked sharply, not particularly caring about the answer.

"Good. Is your mom home?" he asked, and this was one of the ways I could tell he didn't miss me like my mom said. If he wanted to talk to me, he would try and make conversation, even though he was hopeless at it, much like me.

"No, I'll tell her you called," I said, hoping that would be the conclusion of our conversation.

"Oh, well, I'll tell you what's happening now. So, it's been a madhouse at work lately, and I'm behind on a lot of stuff. I think we're going to have to take a rain check on next week," he explained. I knew that his reasoning was a lie. He just didn't want to have the extra responsibility of me being around; he was perfectly content working double and even triple shifts while I was there.

"Oh. Okay. I'll tell her. Thanks," I replied, unsure of how I was supposed to react.

"I'm sorry, M. Maybe you can come and visit for a weekend or something sometime. We'll figure something out. Just tell your mom I called, alright?" I sighed.

"Yeah, it's no big deal. Did you tell Catherine? You said to mom that she said I could visit her, too," I said, the tiniest ounce of disappointment filling my voice.

"No, not yet. I will. Listen, M, I have to go, okay? I'll talk to you later," he replied. My mother was truly delusional for thinking he actually cared about me and wanted to spend time with me.

"Okay. Bye," I said icily, feeling my usual anger that occurred whenever I had to speak with him build up. I heard the click of the phone from his line, and I sighed as I hung up my side, too. I tried to push all of my thoughts from my mind, and just focus on the fact that I had another week to relax.

Later, as I heard my mom arguing with my dad on the phone about his last minute cancellation, I resorted to my old technique of hiding under blankets to muffle the sound of yelling. I really hated hearing them fight; it was almost always because of me, and it was simply just unpleasant. I could still hear my mom's angry tone, and I pretended to ignore it. The thing was, she wasn't fighting with him because she knew I was disappointed; she was fighting with him because she probably just wanted to get rid of me for a week. I didn't really mind that much; I got kind of sick of me too sometimes.

Knowing full well that I shouldn't feel disappointed about my cancelled "vacation", I still did feel a bit upset. I wasn't going to get to see Catherine, and I was kind of psyching myself up for that. It probably wasn't going to be as exciting as I thought it would be, anyway, but it still sucked a little. I could still talk to her on the phone and email her, though, right? It would be essentially the same as seeing her in person. If I had my way in the first place, I would never have been taking a plane to Vegas, so this was just like I had made my choice on my terms. Well, it wasn't really, but that's what I was telling myself.

I would never admit this, ever, to anyone, including Catherine, but a small part of me was disappointed about not seeing my dad, as well. We never got along and we never had anything to speak about, I know, but he was my dad after all. Throughout my whole life he had always been caught up with work, which always gave me a small desire to want to be closer with him. It was stupid, because he probably didn't reciprocate this in the least, but as much as I denied the fact that I wanted to know him better, it didn't go away. I sometimes wondered what it would have been like if we had a close relationship, and every time the thought passed through my mind, I had to convince myself that the way things were already were just fine. I'm sure most people wouldn't agree with me, but I didn't really agree with me, either.

Just because my dad cancelled didn't mean he didn't love me, right? He was just being his usual extremely anti-social self, which just also applied to being social with his daughter. I should have totally understood his actions, because I didn't really want to see him, either, but then there was that small part of me that did. He never really made an effort to be involved in my life, but it's not like he hated me, or at least I hoped not. No, there was no way he hated his only daughter. Or maybe he did. He probably did, I guess. I would ask for Catherine's advice, but then I'd have to admit that his actions were affecting me, and there was no way I was going to do that. I could figure this puzzle out by myself; I was good at that.

* * *

Thank you so much to everyone who reads/reviews/favourites/follows/etc., you guys all make my day:) I have one more chapter already written and then my next update might take awhile because of exams :(


	12. XII

Taking a brief break from studying and decided to post this now before I totally forget! Enjoy and thank you for reading!

* * *

**XII**

I tried not to give my mother any clues that I was upset about my Spring Break plans being cancelled, I really did, but even after so many years of perfecting the act of pretending there was absolutely nothing wrong, sometimes I messed that up a little. Or maybe my mom was just finally figuring me out. I really hoped it was the former; I didn't even have myself figured out, so why should someone else get the right to that? I think she figured me out this time because the whole situation kind of threw me off my game. Even though it drove everyone mental, they took notice when I didn't have some sort of remark for everything.

In the last few days of my much anticipated break, I had reluctantly agreed to go out with a couple of my new friends for the afternoon. As much as I had become a lot less passive and shy, I still got pretty stressed out at the prospect of being around people I still didn't really know all that well. There was just so much I had to think about; I had to make sure I appeared relaxed, but I couldn't actually relax or I might do something stupid. The whole prospect of going out had kind of been ruined for me after my experience not that long ago, as well, but at least I knew that would not be happening again anytime soon. I wasn't going to let myself do something idiotic again any time in the near future, and this time around I had managed to choose new people who I assumed agreed with that premise.

Towards the end of the afternoon, the four of us were sitting on one of those couches in the mall that I never believed actually served a purpose until now. I hadn't actually bought anything, I had just acted as an incredibly patient helper for everyone else. I didn't have any money of my own at the moment, and asking my mom always killed me a little.

"Do you have plans tonight, Morgan?" Natalie, an intimidatingly tall brunette who had been the first one of my new friends to acknowledge my existence, asked. I could immediately feel my heart speed up a little; things were probably going to get awkward rather quickly.

"Um, not really, why?" I replied casually, or at least that's how I tried to make it sound.

"My sister's having a party and she said that we could come as long as we don't do anything stupid," she said, smiling like getting invited to her own sibling's party was a major achievement. Internally, I was already crying as I tried to think of an answer that wouldn't make me lose my new friends. And what even qualified as stupid? As far as I could tell, people were pretty much down for anything at the party I attended, including supporting guys cheating on their girlfriends.

"Oh, sorry, I don't think I can," I said, hoping that they would leave it at that. Of course, that would be the easy way out, and why would that happen? The universe had been truly testing my strength as of late, and this was just another one of those times.

"Why not?" Serena, another one of the girls asked as she ran her fingers through her dirty blonde hair. Serena was also new to the school this year, but she was much more outgoing than me so she hadn't encountered a problem with trying to find people that would befriend her like I had.

"I'm probably not allowed," I explained quickly. That was a completely logical reason, despite it being somewhat embarrassing. I'm sure my mom would've never let me go to the first party if I had asked, so it was extremely safe to say that this one would have been a non-starter.

"Just make something up," Brittany chirped in. While I really liked Natalie and Serena, I was still a bit wary of Brittany. I think I was a bit intimidated; she had that look of "classic beauty" that everyone admires, and she was fully aware of it.

"No, I can't, my mom would kill me," I continued, trying to make them stop.

"That's stupid. It's not like anything bad is going to happen." I gave Serena a sideways glance and took a deep breath, deciding to avoid indulging into a story of what can happen.

"Yeah, what's her problem? We're not going to do anything bad," Brittany added. I sighed, wanting to tell them that it wasn't that simple. I know I wasn't exactly a high school party veteran, but I knew a hell of a lot more than them.

"You only have four years of high school, she should actually let you live them," Natalie stated with a judgmental tone.

"You know what?" I said, suddenly angry. "She's just trying to protect me, and I'm okay with that, because I've done some stupid stuff, and I don't want it to happen again. You guys can go, but I'm not joining you." My hands felt a little shaky again; the rush I got from standing up for myself felt both refreshing and terrifying.

"Jeez, Morgan, okay. We're not forcing you to go," Brittany scoffed.

"Yeah, we were just trying to help," Natalie piped in. I rolled my eyes.

"Sure, because that's what it sounds like," I replied, trying to calm down a little. I don't know what caused the sudden defending of my mom, but it was certainly out of character.

"Well, on that note, we should probably go to get ready and stuff, so, see you later," Serena said coldly. I glared at her as she got up and gestured for the others to follow suit. I got up as well, starting to go in the opposite direction. I could hear their hushed whispers and I was more than aware they were about me, which made my cheeks heat up significantly as my hands continued to shake. I twisted a few loose strands of hair between my fingers for what felt like the thousandth time in the past few minutes and headed for the exit of the mall. I always assumed people were talking about me behind my back, but it made it so much worse when it was actually confirmed that they were.

I took the bus home by myself, an anxiety-inducing activity in itself. I tried to make myself forget about what had just happened as I walked up the driveway to my house, but every second of the whole encounter was burned on my brain. It had just been a simple argument, yes, but all three of them were taking the same side, which left me as even more of an outsider than I was before.

In all honesty, I was probably angrier about the whole thing than I was sad, even though the latter was still heavily present in my emotions. Understandably, my new friends were not going to automatically listen to what I had to say, especially since they were not afraid of confrontation like I was (even though that fear was ever so slowly starting to diminish). However, they could have respected my decision, or they even could have agreed that it wasn't their best plan, even though they were going to go through with it anyway. Just because I had the unpopular opinion didn't make me wrong, of course. I had enough previous knowledge to make my own choice, and I had made the right one. I knew that, and I hated that the whole argument had made me doubt that confidence I had in myself.

When I got into the house, I felt more upset than ever, so I elected to simply storm up to my room and avoid any form of communication with anyone. Both of my parents were home, much to my chagrin, so they would do their usually complaining about me never leaving my room, but I couldn't have cared less. Upon reaching my room, I closed the door and took a single deep breath, once again trying to make myself forget what happened. I sat on my bed, unsure of what to do with myself, and leaned my head back on the blue wall beside me. I shut my eyes, trying to think of something else to distract me from the fact that I might have just lost the friends I had only just recently gained.

Suddenly, I felt tears rolling down my cheeks, and I internally cursed myself for acting like such a child. I was fully aware that I shouldn't have been concerned with what those three girls thought about me, especially when I knew I was making a good decision, but it still managed to get under my skin. As I let myself have a moment to let my crying out, as much as I hated it, it did make me feel just the slightest bit better. Allowing myself to have emotions, even when I was completely alone, was a good thing, even though I didn't really agree with that premise.

"Morgan? How was your day?" My head quickly darted over to the door, which my mother had decided to open without permission, probably just to spite me.

"It was fine," I replied, hoping she wouldn't ask for an elaboration.

"Why are you upset, then?" she asked. I once again lamented the fact that she could actually tell when I was upset. Plus she always felt the need to ask about it, which I really should have felt grateful for, but I didn't.

"No reason. I'm not upset." I found myself cursing myself one more time as I realized I had essentially admitted that I was, in fact, upset when I had denied it in my first two words.

"What happened? Did you guys fight about something?" she asked, sitting down beside me on my bed.

"They invited me to a party tonight and I said no and then they got mad at me," I mumbled quickly, hoping that could maybe be the extent of our conversation. Even though I had no desire to talk to anyone right now, I didn't have a whole lot of choice.

"Why did you say no?" she asked, and I looked at her with the biggest look of confusion I could muster. Was she even asking that?

"Okay, first of all, you would have killed me, and second of all, I'm not exactly into the whole idea after my last experience," I explained.

"Well, I'm glad I've scared you into not wanting to go," she laughed, but I didn't join her. "But Morgan, I'm not encouraging you to go by any means, but you know every party isn't going to end like that, right?"

"Yeah, I'm not stupid, but I just don't want to go," I said matter-of-factly.

"Good. That makes my life a lot easier." I subtly rolled my eyes. "And less stressful," she added.

"Glad I could help," I said sarcastically.

"Alright, Morgan, what's been bugging you lately? You've been acting more sullen than usual." What she really meant was that I was acting more obnoxious than usual, but she was just trying to put it into nicer words for the girl who had just made her job as a parent a little more convenient.

"Nothing. I'm fine," I replied, trying to find a spot on the ceiling I could focus on so I didn't start getting all teary again.

"It's the trip getting cancelled, isn't it?"

"No," I dismissed, even though deep down, I knew she had figured me out.

"I know that's what it is," she said with the know-it-all tone that usually annoyed me, but somehow it didn't this time. I looked at her briefly before looking away again. "Listen, Morgan, to be honest, your dad is a jerk. Trust me, I know. He loves you, as much as you don't think he does, and he cares about you, too, but he's just got a strange way of showing it. Try not to take it personally, okay?"

"How am I not supposed to take it personally?" I snapped. "He didn't want to see me, so he made up a lame excuse. I don't see how I'm supposed to not take offense to that, even though I hate him." The last part wasn't really supposed to be said, but it made me feel better nonetheless.

"You don't hate him," my mother stated, and I rolled my eyes yet again.

"How do you know? You're not me," I replied sharply.

"Yes, honey, I know that, but I also know you don't hate him. You don't know him enough to hate him; he hasn't given you that opportunity. You're angry at him, and I understand that, because I am, too, but saying you hate him isn't going to change anything," she explained, and for once, I was almost on the same page as her.

"It's all just so frustrating," I whispered as I felt more tears threaten to fall. I blinked them away quickly. I couldn't believe I was actually admitting my defeat to my mom.

"I understand. It will all work itself out. And about your friends today, just forget about it. They probably have already, so you should do the same. What they think doesn't matter," she said, trying to be helpful.

"I can't just forget about it. That's not how it works," I explained in the best way I could. Delving into the way my mind operated was not something I was willing to do.

"Well, then just remember that you did the right thing. And I'm very proud of you," she smiled. I suddenly looked at her again, almost not believing what I had just heard.

"Thanks," I said quietly, still somewhat pretending I didn't really care.

"I love you, Morgan," she said, giving me a hug. I froze at first, not knowing exactly how to reciprocate, but eventually hugged her back, even though it was somewhat awkward. My whole life was a string of awkwardness, so why should this be any different?

"Love you, too," I said back. It was the first time I had said such words in a while. Was this a sudden turning point in our relationship? Did the fact that we both shared similar feelings towards my dad a sign for her that I was actually a human being capable of feeling things? I wasn't entirely sure, but I'm not sure I was complaining about that, either.

* * *

I doubt anyone noticed this, but all of Morgan's friends mentioned in this chapter shared the same names as some of the characters Elisabeth Harnois has played in various movies and TV shows :) Haha, anyway, thank you again for reading and I will try and post the next chapter as soon as I can but I'm not sure when that's going to be...


	13. XIII

I'm back! Finally done exams as of yesterday so I wrote this last night, enjoy!

* * *

**XIII**

Reaching a slightly happier point in my relationship with my mother somehow made my life just have the tiniest bit of stress lifted from it. When I was at school, I was constantly overly self-aware, or feeling like I was going to die from all the stress that the prospect of being in the same room as twenty-nine other people my age brought on. Typically, when I got home, I didn't get a chance to let my stress go, as there was always something going on with my mother and I that required some sort of argument or situation where I always had to be on my toes. Since we had experienced that exceptionally short, yet beneficial, bonding moment, the disagreements had significantly diminished. We actually got along well sometimes; we weren't best friends like some of the other girls my age were with their moms, but it was a big step from the way it had been. Of course, I still wasn't confiding in her with the daily problems that I always made much more melodramatic than necessary, but that wasn't going to happen anytime soon, regardless of how much closer we had gotten.

The relationship with my father was still extremely rocky, obviously, and neither he nor I had an intention in changing that. Or, maybe he did, but his efforts were lousy, and trying to tell whether or not he cared was exhausting. I still had to suffer through the occasional phone call with him, and I think suffer is a major understatement, but other than that, I was avoiding contact at all costs. Catherine was still the only person in Vegas I had an interest in communicating with. I always wished I could go and visit her without seeing my father at all, but that was most definitely just wishful thinking. Thankfully, the Spring Break visit had not been rescheduled; that was probably partly because my mother was appreciative of the fact that I hadn't been so difficult lately, so she wasn't desperate to get rid of me for a while.

I had also made up quite easily with my friends since the brief incident regarding the party. Unlike me, they didn't take everything so seriously and regard every little situation as a major deal, so I really had overreacted. That was always very common for me; even when I realized I was overthinking or blowing things out of proportion, I couldn't help myself. My mom was the same way, and even though I couldn't stand when anyone compared the two of us, it was true in this situation, and probably part of why we fought so much. Thankfully, my friends were absolutely nothing like that; they had almost acted like the incident had never happened. We had just gone back to normal, which was something that rarely happened to me, so I was very appreciative.

The second semester of my sophomore year was ever so slowly coming to a close, and most nights I found myself swamped with homework. I was a good student, for the most part, but was slowly morphing into more and more of a perfectionist. I found myself doing homework or studying for much longer than I needed to sometimes. This was partly wanting to do as well as I possibly could manage, but also because sometimes I just needed to take a break from actual people and focus on doing a set of somewhat pointless math problems for a half hour or so. It gave me a thing that could completely distract from whatever else had been occupying my thoughts during the day, and sometimes that was exactly what I needed.

On one of the nights I was doing said math problems, I had been playing my music at a decent volume level through my computer, quietly singing along while I tried to focus on the equations sitting in front of me at the same time. My parents had just gotten back from dinner; I had been invited but had declined in an attempt to give myself some alone time.

Over my music, I could hear voices, but I ignored it as I often did, despite the unusually loud volume. The talking, or yelling from what it sounded like, persisted, so I turned the music off and attempted to listen in. This was partly worry, partly eavesdropping; I couldn't resist an opportunity to be nosy. The shouting I heard was actually wildly out of character for my mom and soon to be step-dad, despite the fact my mother was pretty much a professional at shouting matches after spending however many years it was with my dad. This gave me an ounce of concern, but I remained where I was. Being pretty familiar with the role of the daughter who was expected to take sides, I knew that going downstairs was lacking any sort of benefit for me. For the two people arguing downstairs, I may have acted as a good buffer at the time, but I wasn't a fan of the role.

After the fighting had continued for several minutes, or so it seemed, I suddenly realized that I had neglected to assume my usual position of hiding under blankets so I couldn't hear. I think that this time, I felt a bit of concern, as this was a brand new occurrence ever since the divorce. It was probably nothing; I had learned that from previous experience, but that didn't make it any less out of the ordinary. I did briefly consider sticking my head outside the door to make sure that there wasn't actually a murderer or something downstairs, but then I realized that it really was in my best interests to stay put, murderer or not.

Eventually, the noise subsided, or at least some of it, and I heard the front door shut rather forcefully. Listening for any sign of anyone being left in the house besides me, I managed to hear some footsteps, and I assumed it was my mother. Immediately, I felt bad; this kind of thing hadn't happened in a while, so the return of a heated argument probably stung more than usual. It wasn't like me to go downstairs and talk to her, even if it was just to take her mind off of what had happened, but despite that, I was going.

"Mom?" I said, cautiously stepping down the carpeted steps.

"Not now, Morgan, I can help you later," she said, defeated. Typically, a response of that nature would have upset me to no end, and it still did a little bit, but I let it slide. At least she would have been willing to help me with homework later; a few months earlier, I bet the offer wouldn't have been present at all.

"That's not what I was going to ask," I said pointedly. She looked up from her spot on the couch, and I offered only the tiniest of sympathetic glances. "What happened?" I asked, already regretting my question. In the past, I had been the least helpful person in the world when it came to venting about various issues, and I was fully aware of that fact.

"It's nothing, Morg, don't worry about it," she responded as I took a seat next to her. I fiddled with the sleeve of my shirt, pretending that counting the pink stripes and the white stripes was far more important. I wanted to be able to press the issue, I really did, but it probably wasn't going to happen.

"Where did Jerry go?" I asked, internally flinching as I waited for an outburst of a response. She looked at me in the same way I often looked at her when she asked questions I had no desire to answer.

"I don't know," she said, annoyed. Much like me, she was completely unsure of what to do with her hands, so she settled on wringing them carefully, as if she didn't want me to notice.

"Oh. Um, so, is everything okay?" I continued awkwardly, despite the fact that we were both completely content with ending the conversation there, or so it seemed.

"Not really. You know, after your dad left, I thought I would be rid of all of this," she said, and I thought she might elaborate, but unfortunately I had no such luck. I would've been good at just sitting there trying to make sense of whatever nonsense she could have been rambling about, but instead I had to actually contribute to the conversation. The conversation stilled for a moment while I tried to come up with something of substance to mention. Comforting words were not exactly my strong suit, especially when it came to talking to my parents. Their attempts at comforting me were often misguided, and I often followed in their footsteps.

"I never thought he would actually leave," I said quietly, almost wishing I had just stayed silent. To my knowledge, my mom and I had never had much of a proper conversation about my father leaving. It felt unbelievably unnatural.

"You know what?" she said, a slight edge to her voice. I looked at her, wondering what kind of reaction my statement had provoked. "I never thought so either." We both paused, even though she was just waiting for me to respond, while I was at my usual loss for words. All of a sudden, almost at the drop of a hat, I felt my eyes overflow with tears.

"I don't want that to happen again," I said tearfully, visibly angry at myself for crying. My mother probably thought I was some emotionally unstable basket case with how I had been acting lately.

"Hey, Morgan, it's okay, it's not going to happen again. I promise," she replied, giving me a half-hearted hug. It was rather selfish of me to be suddenly emotional over something that affected me so minimally compared to everyone else.

"You don't know that," I retorted quickly, then immediately feeling guilty for saying so.

"Honey, you're not being all that consoling," my mom laughed, even though she didn't sound particularly overjoyed.

"Sorry, I'm not thinking," I explained quietly, quickly wiping my eyes and trying to forget what had happened. "You know, Jerry is a whole lot different from dad, and I know he wouldn't just get up and leave."

"Like you said, Morgan, you don't know that." I winced at her comment, completely regretting my earlier remark. "I know it was just a pointless argument, but that's how it always starts."

Even though I found it weird that my mother was actually engaged to someone else in what was such a seemingly short time after the separation from my dad, it didn't mean I didn't support her new relationship. I wasn't heartless; I wanted her to be happy, and as a bonus, I got along with Jerry as well. If he left, it would have gone back to the dreary, angst filled stage that had been present mere months before. When it was just my mom and I, the amount of stress and strain it put on the two of us was far from enjoyable for anyone. I was actually content with the way my family, minus the portion from Vegas, was operating, and I didn't want to lose that.

"It's not going to be like that. I shouldn't have said anything. It's going to be fine, alright? It was one thing that happened and it really didn't sound that bad," I said in a rushed manner. In absolutely no way did I find myself sounding convincing, so I'm assuming it didn't transfer well.

"You already said what we were both thinking, Morgan. We don't know, okay? There's nothing you can say that will change the outcome," my mother said, sounding more miffed at me than anything. I sighed subtly.

"Stop it," I said abruptly. At that, we shared a moment of having no clue where I was taking this. "Just don't make an assumption based on what's happened before. I know you're scared, and I am, too, which is weird. But, it's going to be fine. And even if something bad happens, it's not going to be the end of the world. We've gotten through it once, so we can do it again, right? Nothing is going to come of this, though. Jerry loves you, so it's different. You can't tell me you know what's going to happen, because you really have no idea, which is scary, yeah, but that's just how it works." I finally looked up from the ground, which had been my point of focus during my entire small speech. My mother, being the sappy, emotional being that I never would be, had tears in her eyes, which almost made me want to take everything I had said back.

"You're right. That was so lovely of you to say, Morgan. I never hear stuff like that from you," she said tearfully, once again hugging me. I almost felt like squirming away, but I continued my act of lovely, supporting daughter and didn't.

"I better go finish my homework," I said suddenly, not wanting to succumb to emotions for the second time in a rather short time span.

"Alright," my mother replied, almost confused at how quickly I had turned back into my reclusive self. I hurried back upstairs, shutting the door to my room behind me. I went straight back to my math homework, but after several long minutes, I couldn't muster up the ability to focus that more often than not just came naturally.

It had to be weird that my mom and Jerry's fight had shaken me up so much, right? Or maybe it wasn't; I, much like my mother, was assuming the worst and letting the smallest of things get to me. I seldom cared about these things, or at least I pretended I didn't, so outwardly feeling sympathetic and even upset was a change of pace.

I stuck my head outside the door and took a few quiet steps down the stairs until the spot on the couch where my mother was sitting came into full view. She was still sitting in the same position, but crying instead of being strong for me and keeping it to herself. It was almost scary how similar we were in that respect, as much as I hated to admit it to myself. Seeing her upset made me upset, but I couldn't bring myself to potentially place us both in an awkward situation by barging in again. I tiptoed back to my room, picking up the home phone I saw on the way, and carefully shut the door behind me again.

I was going to call Jerry, as much as it pained me to do so. He probably had no interest in talking to my mother right now, meaning he didn't necessarily want to talk to me either, but it was happening anyway. I would tell my mother about this later when it was okay to laugh about it and mention how much I didn't want to make the call, but did anyway.

Quickly dialling the number to his cell phone before I could change my mind, I held the phone to my ear and took a deep breath while I thought of what to say. It rang several times, making me think that he wasn't going to pick up, which honestly made me feel relieved.

"Hello?" Damn it.

"Hi," I said somewhat quietly.

"Rose, I really don't want to talk right now…" he started.

"It's Morgan," I corrected, somewhat appalled at the fact that he thought I was my mother.

"Oh, sorry, Morgan, what's going on?" Jerry asked.

"Um, is everything okay? Where are you?" I asked, trying not to sound as upset as I was actually getting.

"Yeah, Morg, I'm fine. I'm just out right now, okay? Are you alright?" I sighed at the response; it was almost a repeat of my earlier conversation.

"I'm fine. When are you coming back?" I asked matter-of-factly, wanting to just get the conversation over with.

"I don't know," Jerry replied. I felt my eyes cloud over a little, but this time I was more angry than sad.

"What do you mean you don't know? Are you coming back?" I somewhat snapped at him. I think both of us were a bit taken aback; I had never snapped at Jerry since he had moved in. At the beginning, yes, I had been a little snarky, but I was just maintaining appearances.

"Of course I'm coming back," he said, almost as if he was trying to make me feel bad for even thinking of asking.

"When?" I asked, pressing the issue.

"Morgan, I don't know, alright?" Jerry's use of my full name was somewhat of a rarity, so I must have been really getting on his nerves.

"Well, you scared us, okay? My mom and I have been left on our own before, and I just want to know now if it's happening again instead of just waiting and freaking myself out," I exclaimed, keeping my voice from shaking successfully.

"I'm coming back. I'll be back soon, so stop worrying. I'm sure your mom will be happy to know you called," Jerry said almost instantaneously, probably because he either wanted to make sure I didn't go into a tailspin, or because he just wanted me to end the call. Maybe it was both.

"You weren't fighting about me, were you?" I asked suddenly. I hadn't thought that through when I was thinking about what I was going to say; it had only been a small thought at the back of my mind.

"Of course not. It's not your fault at all," Jerry said sincerely, and it completely convinced me. I would, of course, still worry about it, but at least I could remind myself later that there was a confirmation that it wasn't true.

"Okay. Thank you. You really scared me, okay? And I don't usually get caught up in this stuff," I replied with a breathless laugh, blinking to keep my eyes clear.

"I know. I'm sorry. Bye, Morg," he said.

"Bye," I said, hanging up and breathing a sigh of relief.

Even though it was probably the wrong decision to withhold the information I had just obtained, I elected to start attempting to sleep instead of wrapping myself up in more drama. It would have been much nicer of me to go downstairs and inform my mother that all was going to be okay, but even though I hadn't dealt with a whole lot, it felt like way too much parental drama. That wasn't even supposed to be happening anymore.

As I was starting to drift off, I could hear the door open, followed by some murmured voices that didn't sound remotely angry like they had earlier. It gave me the smallest sense of satisfaction knowing that I might have helped in the resolution, even if it was just in the slightest amount. I also felt a big sense of relief knowing that I hadn't inadvertently caused any of the argument. That was often a worry that plagued me when my mom and dad fought constantly, but I had never done anything to try and diminish the fear. At least I had enough confidence to ask, even though I didn't have enough confidence to not automatically assume I was the problem.

"Good morning," my mom said as she walked past my room in the morning. I was doing my usual procrastinating by writing my latest installment in my emails to Catherine when I should have been finishing getting ready for school.

"Morning," I responded absent-mindedly.

"I know you don't think you were, but you were really wonderful last night, Morgan. Thank you again. I like being reminded that you actually do care," my mom said, smiling a little.

"Yeah," I said, brushing her comment off as she walked away. It did resonate with me a little, enough to make me choose to do something I had never done without major protest on my part before. I picked up the phone that was still sitting in my room from last night and dialled.

"Hello?"

"Hi, dad," I said, still shocked at the almost random choice I had just made.

"Oh, hey, M. What's up?" he replied, sounding as surprised as I would have if he had called me.

"Nothing, just wanted to talk."

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So I wanted to have some Morgan character development towards her being as empathetic and lovely as she is on CSI now :) Hope you enjoyed! Next chapter will hopefully be this weekend :)


	14. XIV

**XIV**

"Oh, that's nice of you, but I'm not sure if I can talk right now." Typical. He never wanted to talk, but I was honestly a little surprised that the trend continued even when I had actually been willing to speak with him.

"Why?" I asked, trying to maintain a light-hearted tone.

"You know work always gets in the way," he said, and I rolled my eyes. Using work as an excuse was really starting to become a more than tedious response.

"Yeah, but I just have a few extra minutes before school. I'm always busy after school," I lied. I was never really that busy after school; I just never wanted to speak with him. He really should have been taking advantage of the fact that I had started this conversation and was seemingly more than happy to continue with it.

"Yeah, alright, good point. How's school?" he asked, and I let myself smile a little. Finally, my father was taking interest in my life, even though it was forced.

"It's good. I'm getting ninety-eight percent in French and even though it's the most boring class ever, I got a hundred percent on my last History test," I said, bragging a little.

"Wow. Good for you, M. Are you going to take Spanish at some point? You know, there are lots of Spanish speakers here, so it could come in handy," he trailed off, kind of knowing what my initial thought process was about the fact that he was insinuating I would ever live in Vegas with him again.

"I might. I don't have space in my timetable next year, though, so maybe I'll do something online or something," I commented, trying to keep the conversation rolling and away from the awkward mess it could deteriorate into.

"What are you taking next year?" I was genuinely shocked at the fact that my dad was actually contributing to the conversation as well. The whole act could have stopped at any minute, but I was very impressed.

"The usual stuff; English, Math, and History… And then Chemistry, Biology, and Physics, French, and then Law as well," I replied. Science was kind of my thing.

"That's great. I'm glad you're taking the sciences. Is that what you want to do after high school? You know, I think you'd be a great CSI," he asked. I didn't know how I felt about his last remark. I was kind of happy that he thought I'd be good at his current occupation, but I also didn't want him to assume that I was just going to follow in his footsteps no matter what.

"I don't know, really. I'm really good at chemistry, and science is just cool in general. I haven't thought much about after high school," I admitted. It wasn't a thought that was really that prominent in my mind. There was always too much for me to think about.

"You should start thinking, M, you're going to be graduating before you know it," he remarked and I automatically rolled my eyes. As if I didn't hear it enough from my mother and every single teacher in the school; I was fully aware of what grade I was in and exactly how long I had until graduation. Somehow, I was going to survive without his almost passive-aggressive comments.

"I know."

"Sorry, I bet you hear that a lot." Wow, an apology. I was floored. Might as well have declared me dead; this never happened. Close to sixteen years of my life and I had never heard something even remotely resembling an apology from my dad.

"Yeah, it's fine, at least you're concerned," I offered weakly, not having any sort of clue for how to respond to the first apology I had ever been the recipient of from him.

"You know, we never did schedule another time when you could visit," he said. I suppressed a sigh, but it was still there in spirit as the seconds passed with no response. "How about this weekend?"

"Yeah, sure, that sounds great," I replied. At least I would get to miss a day or two of school. "I'll mention it to mom on the way to school."

"Perfect. Okay, M, I'll talk to you later, but I'm glad we've worked this out." When he said 'this' did he mean our entire relationship? I may have been willing to work past a bit of the underlying (or more like overlying, most of the time) hatred for a bit, as I had almost subconsciously decided to start being a better daughter by calling him, but I certainly hadn't forgiven him for anything. It was just me attempting to be somewhat more mature about the situation, even though I had the right to be as childish as I wanted to be about it, really. The act of me agreeing to visit was probably going to be over-analyzed by everyone; was I finally done with being such an overly-emotional teenager? Surely, that's what everyone would ask, or at least what they would wonder to themselves.

"Yeah. Bye," I said awkwardly, hanging up the phone before I dug myself into an even deeper hole. It wouldn't be that bad, right? I had almost completely patched things up with my mom, so miracles were obviously somewhat plausible. I wasn't willing to forgive him at all; I didn't think that would ever happen in my lifetime. There were too many things that I believed warranted either an explanation or an apology, and I still held a grudge on all of them.

My mother was surprisingly supportive of the rescheduled visit, and had managed to find plane tickets before I could think twice about the situation. I was departing LA on Friday morning, and thankfully Catherine was going to pick me up at the airport again; a drive back from the airport with my father was probably way too much of an uncomfortable situation for anyone to handle. I would be back late Sunday night, which, after long negotiation with my mother, had turned into an excuse to miss school the next day. I was sacrificing my sanity for this trip, so it was only appropriate that I got to take a couple days off in return.

Six in the morning had always felt early to me, but it was especially difficult when my reluctance to leave the city was increasing with every passing second. I had assured myself again and again that I was going to be absolutely fine; nothing could compare to the terrible experience last time, right? Right. In the worst case scenario, I would be stuck in my dad's office half the time, and at least that could resemble something of interest, as long as he wasn't around. My internal ramblings and reassurances made me feel like a terrible daughter, and maybe I was, but maintaining my overly bitter and snarky monologue was keeping me from running far, far away from the airport.

I decided on working on the math homework I was missing at school while I was on the flight. I had learned from a ton of experience that it was best to make myself at least look busy when I was flying by myself, or else I was going to be privy to unfortunate small talk with whoever was next to me. It was, of course, unenjoyable for me every time, so I'm assuming the other person didn't find it all that pleasant, either. I was really doing everyone a favour as I sat and tried to solve for x.

The flight went by rather quickly, making me hope that this was some sort of warped metaphor for the trip going by faster than I expected. You know, I shouldn't really have been complaining, since if I had gone at Spring Break I would have been stuck in Nevada for a whole week, and now I only had a couple days of potential suffering, but still.

My mind flashed back to the last time I was in the airport lobby as I stood there yet again. The assumption that my dad had forgotten about me had almost been accurate at the time, and it was close to no different this time. At least I had been informed that someone else was in charge of chauffeuring me to the lab or empty apartment, depending on my luck. Last time I was here had been my first time meeting Catherine, as well, and that had certainly been more than beneficial to me. Even though I essentially barely knew her, we had only met once in person, I was so excited at the prospect of getting to actually speak with her face to face again, as she was basically my hero.

I spotted her after a few minutes of wandering through the airport, and my face immediately broke out in a grin.

"Catherine!" I said excitedly, grabbing her attention. I walked over to her, pretending to be a little less ecstatic than I actually was.

"Hey, Morgan!" she exclaimed, immediately pulling me in for a hug, something that I usually minded, but I wasn't as morally offended as I usually was. "I think I'm required to make the clichéd statement that you've grown so much since I last saw you, but you have." I playfully rolled my eyes.

"At least you know that it's cliché," I remarked lightheartedly. We picked up my bag from baggage claim and headed to her car. I was already sad that I wouldn't get to spend the whole weekend with her, but at least this was somewhat of an unspoken compromise.

"So what made you agree to this weekend?" Catherine asked pointedly.

"What do you mean?" I asked. I had always assumed that she was somewhat oblivious to the quantity of daily angst my dad caused me; I knew she knew about a lot of it, of course, but to what extent is what I was uncertain of. Our emails and phone calls didn't often consist of much conversation about my dad; it was always a subject I preferred to avoid. This was a good thing to me. It was easy to look at the relationship between my father and me and blame me for the negativity, in a way.

"Morgan, come on, I'm not stupid," she said, raising her eyebrows. I smiled a little.

"I know that!" I said happily. "I just didn't know you were lucky enough to know about absolutely all the drama between my dad and I," I joked.

"Of course I do," she stated. I think this was relieving to me, as much as I kind of didn't want her to know.

"I guess I was just feeling nice, so I called him out of the blue, and then he suggested it, and I was still feeling nice, so I would've felt bad saying no," I replied simply.

"Well, I think it's great of you. I know you may not have the best time, but at least you're doing the right thing," she said.

"You know, you're the first person who's said that. Everyone else is trying to tell me that I'll have the best time, and we all know that's not true. I know it's probably going to suck, but there's not much I can do, and I can feel like I'm being a good daughter for a couple weeks after," I told her. She smiled.

"Exactly. You'll be fine," Catherine said, and I nodded. She was totally right, as she usually was, and actually being able to vocalize what I thought of the trip without being lectured was nice.

We arrived at the lab all too soon. I knew the drive wasn't going to last forever, obviously, but every moment that I spent talking to Catherine made me wish that it could've. I said goodbye and thanked her profusely for picking me up at the airport and reluctantly headed towards the entrance of the building. After almost ten months of avoiding this place like the plague, the feeling of being back was difficult to comprehend. There was no weight being lifted from my shoulders; I wasn't relieved that I was doing the right thing by any stretch of the imagination. I was just there. I didn't want to be, but I was, so I had to make the best of it. Maybe it wouldn't be as bad as I had imagined.

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Thank you for reading! Watched Last Woman Standing today and felt inspired to finish this chapter after seeing all of Morgan's awesomeness :) haha.


	15. XV

Thank you to all of my absolutely lovely reviewers; you guys are way too nice. :) I can't believe I'm posting my fifteenth chapter right now! I never thought I'd post any of this, let alone write fifteen whole chapters! Apologies for how long it has taken; math is really killing me right now so I'm trying to focus on that...but I promise I will get better with the updates. :) Anyway, enough rambling...enjoy! :)

* * *

**XV**

"Hi," I said quietly as I cautiously entered my father's office. To the best of my ability, I had drawn out the process of checking in and receiving a guest pass for as long as humanly possible. Unfortunately, I was no miracle worker, so it was the usual relatively simple and quick operation, but at least I had done my best. Also, I easily could have gone with my impulse to leave the building entirely and run far, far away, so at least I had found a happy medium of sorts.

"Hey," my dad replied, not even looking up. I rolled my eyes without even thinking about it. For all he knew, I was just some co-worker coming in to ask him about whatever homicide they were currently investigating. He would probably prefer that, anyway.

I sat down in the rather uncomfortable chair that was positioned in front of his desk. I felt a pang of pity for whoever had also shared the experience with me of having to sit there and socialize with my dad, whether it be about work or not. The awkwardly tense atmosphere of the room couldn't have been around solely when I was there, right? Maybe it was still lingering from the last time I had been in the room. I wouldn't be surprised.

"Oh, hi Morgan," he said again, finally looking up. I had been correct in my rather facetious suggestion; he didn't even know it was me.

"You don't even recognize my voice anymore?" I asked, immediately chastising myself for thinking out loud. Of course, as part of my complete slip of the tongue, I hadn't used a lighthearted tone in any shape or form; the comment was full of the built up resentment and anger that usually occupied my mind.

"You know that's not it, M. I just wasn't paying attention." Like always. Didn't that go without saying?

"I figured," I mumbled. "Anyway, what kind of case have you been working on?" I asked, half interested and half merely changing the subject. I would be lying to myself if I said I wasn't fascinated by my dad and Catherine's line of work. It was like some sort of twisted jigsaw puzzle; analyzing and putting pieces of someone's demise together and actually doing something productive for society.

"Just finishing the paperwork on a break and enter turned triple homicide. What people do to each other can be terrifying," he explained. My eyes widened; that kind of stuff actually happened? I had somewhat let myself believe that those kinds of things only happened on crime shows on TV, not in real life.

"That's crazy. Is that, like, normal around here?" I asked, almost feeling nervous.

"I guess you could say that. Vegas has a pretty high crime rate, just like any other big city," my dad replied. Was this the way to have a continuing conversation with him?

"Not in LA," I scoffed, even though I knew I was kidding myself so the thought of being murdered wouldn't keep me up at night.

"Of course in LA. But as long as you don't do anything stupid, I think you're going to be just fine," he said with a close to humourless laugh. I raised an eyebrow out of pure annoyance. He didn't even know me enough to insinuate anything. Well, maybe he wasn't insinuating anything at all; to be honest, he was probably just trying to keep the conversation from coming to a halt, but that didn't really matter. No matter what, there was a more than solid chance I was going to take everything my father said very personally and with great offense. It always happened, and I rarely stopped it. It was just another aggravating part of the relationship that probably wasn't ever going to change.

"So, what's the plan for this weekend?" I asked, changing the subject yet again. Sticking to a specific subject for more than a couple minutes would only add a whole lot of unnecessary emotional turmoil (not that there wasn't already a prominent amount already, really).

"I don't know, M, work might keep me pretty busy, so nothing that extravagant," he replied, once again focusing more on his paperwork than he was on me. What was I even supposed to do anymore? Just let the situation die? After essentially sixteen years of trying to overcome the constant obstacles that my dad put in the way of a somewhat normal family dynamic, I guess the universe was getting fed up with telling me that it was never going to change.

I'd like to think that while I had possibly, maybe overreacted in a remote few situations, I was still at least trying to fix things. Yeah, maybe never calling, or ignoring calls altogether, or being a bit of an asshole when I did actually talk to him wasn't the best solution to anything, but it was mostly justified. I'm sure other kids would have had worse reactions.

"Okay, well, I can just hang out here, right?" I asked in a way that was more of a statement than anything. Well, a passive aggressive statement and question hybrid, actually. I decided to just brush past the previous reply and act like it didn't affect me in the least. It shouldn't have, so I shouldn't have let it.

"Yeah, I guess that would be fine, or I can drop you off at Catherine's for the day tomorrow," he suggested. My eyes lit up, but I tried to hide it. I didn't want to give him the satisfaction that one of his ideas was actually good. Also, I was more miffed than anything that I was being passed off to someone else, even if it was Catherine, so I didn't want to seem happy about it.

"Whatever," I said with a bit of an angry tone taking over.

"Morgan," he warned. I rolled my eyes for what was probably the hundredth time as I ran my fingers through my hair, annoyed.

"What?" I snapped back, not caring anymore. If my dad didn't care, than why should I?

"You know exactly what. Don't do this." I gave a more than audible exasperated sigh and looked at him pointedly.

"Don't do what?" I challenged, fully aware of how obnoxious I was being. "Actually care and express emotion when you try and send me to someone else for the billionth time in my life? Because if that's what you mean, I'm sorry I have feelings." I was probably skating on extremely thin ice, but that was fine by me.

"Morgan, you don't need to make such a big deal of everything. Things happen. Do you think I'm trying to avoid seeing you for the whole weekend?"

"Well, yeah." Don't ask questions if you don't already know the answer, right?

"That's not how it works. I can't control my job… And I thought you liked Catherine," he said, throwing the last part in at the last possible moment, maybe hoping to distract me.

"I do! But that's not the point," I exclaimed, feeling nothing but overly frustrated. Our conversations always went in infuriating circles that only ended when someone stormed out of the room.

"Then what is your point, Morgan? Are you just trying to make me feel bad?" my dad asked, proving my theory of how our conversations worked. Sometimes, I don't think either of us really listened to the other; every thought that was vocalized was usually conceived before any speaking actually took place.

"Shouldn't I be asking you the same thing?" I asked angrily, somewhat defeated in my voice, yet trying to hide the feeling all the same. I got up out of my seat and turned around for the door, hoping I would be able to find somewhere to hide out for a while.

"Morgan, come back here, you're being ridiculous." Was I, though? I really don't think I was. I'd been much more 'ridiculous' in the past, at least.

"You know what?" I exclaimed from the doorway, my mind rapidly searching for something to say. "I hate you."

With that, I kept going… Where, I wasn't too sure, but I had to be somewhat out of the way of my dad's office. I could just find a restroom at the lab to hide in for a while as I let myself relax.

I couldn't really believe that I had actually let myself say that. I had accidentally told my mother before of how I was sure that I hated my father, yes, but I had sworn to myself I wouldn't say it to him. This was only going to make things much, much worse than they already were. I had really screwed up this time.

Wasn't it true, though? If I had admitted it twice, and thought about it on more than a few occasions, my true emotion of hatred towards him had to have a bit of truth behind it, right? It was a truly awful thing to think, I know, but I couldn't help it. When I was younger, I had seen kids on television or in movies say that they hated one of their parents, or both of them, and I had always regarded it as utterly absurd. It couldn't be possible, or that's what my less mature and developed brain had believed, anyway. Eventually, I had been taught that reality wasn't quite so perfect, and the drama didn't make things end in such a way that they were better than how they started.

I found the women's restroom and headed inside, electing to just sit on the counter and let myself think. There wasn't as much to think about as I thought there would be. Maybe the whole conversation with my dad had left my brain emotionally drained; I had not had to deal with that in quite some time. I guess I took the relatively smooth relationship with my mother for granted in a way. We never had fights quite so frustrating, and they had never ended like that, nor would they ever. I would never be able to tell my mom I hated her; it was simply not true. Just because we had major disagreements sometimes didn't mean I could actually feel such a way towards her. It just wasn't how it worked, even though it was completely different with my other biological parent.

This time, I don't think I was overreacting. Sometimes, when I reflected on what my dad and I thought about, I was able to recognize and admit that I had maybe messed up a little more than I had thought at the time, but that wasn't the case this time. My last three words were certainly a bit of a mistake, but I was totally in the clear for the rest of the fight. Hell, I had held my own quite well; usually, my emotions escalated too quickly for me to have that ability to be at least a bit rational and think about what I was going to say.

As for my very choice words at the end, I wasn't totally sure what my next move was going to be. It's not like I could totally ignore what happened (or could I?), but I really didn't want to apologize. The whole situation would be too forced; in a way, too awkward to be sincere. That's because I don't think any apology would be all that truthful. Even though I hadn't really meant to say what I did, half of me didn't regret it. Also, it's not like my father was going to suddenly change his mind, apologize as well, and become my best friend for the weekend. Neither of us really wanted that to happen, I don't believe.

It was possible that I shouldn't have made a big deal about staying with Catherine. I would've enjoyed myself more, obviously, and it was another compromise, kind of. Even though my dad and I had agreed to this visit together, I knew now that he didn't want it to transpire into anything that major, just as much as I didn't want it to. But, if I hadn't made it a big deal, that would have been letting my father win, and I hated that. He didn't deserve to win in such a situation like this one; he brought it up in the first place, therefore it all had to be his fault. I could've pretended to be okay to spending the whole day in his office, whether or not he was there, but I still had to make my point.

No matter what was going to happen, at least I was going to be heading back to LA sooner than I thought. I had somewhat accidentally made this trip much more painful than it was going to be originally, but what else was I supposed to do? Well, actually, I could have just kept my mouth shut, but that proved difficult for me sometimes. I could get through whatever was going to happen next, of course. I had dealt with almost every other situation for years, so this wasn't anything I couldn't handle, as much as I didn't want to.

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Hope you liked it! I posted it before sending it to my editor, so please let me know of any mistakes so I can fix them :)


	16. XVI

**XVI**

I know that up until now I had considered almost every experience in my life to have some varying degree of awkwardness, but I am fully confident that nothing compared to the situation I found myself in not long after I had said the three words to my dad that had a good chance of ruining our relationship forever. People within a fifty foot vicinity of us probably felt the second-hand awkwardness radiating from the vehicle as he drove from the lab to his apartment, with me stuck in the passenger's seat against my will. I pitied those people, but not as much as I pitied myself. As selfish as that sounded, it was true. Could anyone really blame me?

Neither of us spoke. I had my eyes glued to the sights that passed me by through the window, trying to act natural but failing. Wishing that I had a better sense of direction, especially when it came to Vegas, an area that I was hopeless in, I prayed that we were close to my dad's apartment. Yeah, that would bring a new uncomfortable situation, but at least I would have a bit of breathing space there. I felt like I was being suffocated via the palpable tension in the car, and I'm sure the same went for my father.

Even breathing too loud felt like an added weight on the ever so far from relaxed atmosphere. Would this ever end? Was I going to be trapped in this situation forever?

Honestly, I would have been content with walking to the apartment… Or even sleeping in the lab. Couldn't I have slept in the morgue or something? There had to be an extra spot in there, right? I should've asked when I had the chance. Anything could've been better than this.

As the silence continued, I wondered who would be the first one to break it. I don't think either of us had the ability to navigate out of this. I sure as hell couldn't, nor did I want to, really. As much as I hated this, I was not willing to make amends just to lighten up the mood.

"So…" My dad trailed off as my head whipped to face him out of shock that he actually said something. I raised an eyebrow, waiting for what would happen next. I realized how obnoxious it was of me not to try and contribute anything, but I guess that was part of my plan. "Never mind." Ah, the worst thing he could've said. Following that, we were stuck there, both wondering what he was going to say, which only added to the silence, if that's possible.

"What?" I asked sharply, in a bit more of a harsh tone than I originally intended. I was such a brat sometimes, and probably still am.

"Nothing," he said, pausing for that ever awkward extra beat that accompanied me to almost every conversation I ever had. "I'll just drop you off at Catherine's tomorrow morning, alright?" To be clear, it was a statement, not a question, even though one could be fooled.

"You got it," I replied half-sarcastically, rolling my eyes. If I had provided a kinder reply, I probably could've lightened the situation up a bit, but I guess I just didn't really care.

"Why are you so defensive today?" Defensive? Hmm, maybe. Unbelievably done with all of this and ready to never see my father again? Precisely.

"I'm not," I denied, turning my head to look out the window again. Why couldn't I have just disappeared?

"You know that's not true. What's going on?" The attempt to sound casual was far from appreciated, merely pitied. I couldn't bring myself to feel sympathy. Did that make me a bad person? Well, with all that had happened in the past few hours, probably.

"Nothing!" I exclaimed, choosing not to elaborate when there was nothing to expand on.

"Come on, M, there has to be something. You're never usually _this _standoffish," he continued, and I sighed. That was the way to get me to talk; essentially attempt to sound concerned but end up insulting me instead. "Are you and your mom arguing again?" I made sure my eyes were completely fixated on the window before thinking of responding. I think I would've preferred it going back to silence at this point.

"As much as you'd like to hear otherwise, no," I said under my breath, but loud enough for him to hear my response. This time, it wasn't me who sighed.

"Morgan," he warned for the second time that day. I looked away from the window long enough to glare at him.

"Yeah?" I challenged, knowing full well how awful I was being. I wonder if he knew that I knew that.

Following the lack of response to my comment, the rest of the drive remained silent, as did most of the evening. There were a few measly attempts at small talk, but the whole situation was plagued with the elephant in the room that was my earlier declaration of hatred. Kind of screwed up with that one, I guess.

I was elated to be getting out of the apartment to go to Catherine's house. It would surely be a huge weight off my chest. As much as everything still bothered me, I had to do my usual routine of pretending I didn't care in the slightest, and I was good at that.

"Let's go, M, we don't have all day," my dad said as I shielded my eyes from the light that was shining down on me. I had the pleasure of sleeping on the most uncomfortable couch on the planet, so not only was I deprived of sleep, but I was being told to hurry while deprived of sleep. I was and never will be a morning person, which is why the night shift is essentially my dream, so the comment was only adding insult to injury, really.

"Go away," I mumbled, but thankfully this time I was the only one who could hear me. I managed to get up and make myself look somewhat presentable in a short amount of time, despite how I wanted to take my time just to be difficult.

Before I knew it, I was being dropped off at the door to Catherine's house, which was far nicer and more welcoming than my dad's apartment ever would be. I was surprised he didn't just slightly slow the car down to let me attempt to leap out; he obviously wasn't as angry as I would have been. We shared only the most awkward of goodbyes, and I was promised (threatened?) that he would be back after his shift.

"You did tell Catherine I was coming, right?" I asked at the last second, suddenly worried.

"Of course I did, M," he replied, driving off. I wasn't convinced. It would've been totally in character for him to merely forget about me, of course. Wasn't that obvious?

I rang the doorbell and waited, wishing I had been here all along. With each passing second, it became more apparent that this must have been a surprise visit, right? I looked back to the road, forgetting that my dad had driven off; he probably didn't care if I made it inside or not, he just wanted the ability to say that I was here.

"Morgan?" Catherine questioned. My heart sank a little as I realized I was probably right in my assumptions. "What are you doing here?"

With that, I was crying, and I wasn't even sure why. Everything had been building up, and I guess my chances of maintaining my tough exterior had been dwindling by the minute. At least I had held it together until after my dad had left, but I could've at least made it through the door first. Catherine didn't seem all that fazed by the fact that I had just shown up to her doorstep and burst into tears, so she ushered me into the house. Thank God for her.

"I'm sorry," I said quickly as she sat next to me on her leather couch. Her house felt too fancy for me to be existing in, yet comfortable all at the same time.

"Don't apologize," she responded immediately, probably because she knew me too well; she knew I would be apologizing the second I was able to form coherent words. "What happened?"

"It's a long story, I guess," I said, definitely still tearful.

"We've got a long time," she replied with a smile, and I laughed a little. I started at the beginning of the somewhat dramatic turn of events, and as usual, she listened to my nonsense without batting an eye. It was like she was specifically trained to deal with me. Countless times I had found myself recalling long, elaborate stories to Catherine when I felt no one else would listen, and she never seemed to mind. I'm pretty sure I owe her for life.

We talked for a long time, even though it didn't feel as long as a conversation with my mother, or almost anyone else for that matter, would have. As always, I felt considerably better, even though I felt like a total basket case again. Being strong on the outside only had so many benefits; sometimes you just had to let it all go and stop trying to act like feelings weren't real.

"I just want to go home," I said suddenly, not even thinking.

"I bet you do," she replied. "Who wouldn't?" I laughed, happy that someone agreed with me.

"True. You know, I feel kind of bad that I'm keeping you up. Isn't it basically nighttime for you?" I asked, gesturing to the broad daylight outside.

"Don't worry about it. I have the night off," she replied.

"Oh. You know, working the night shift sounds pretty awesome," I commented, thinking of how disgusting it was to get up at whatever ungodly hour it was this morning. Also, having to wake up early to go to school felt like it should've been illegal or something.

"It's not as bad as people say. You going to come work for your dad?" Catherine laughed, and I jokingly glared at her.

"He's mentioned that before. I could never do that, even if we worked different shifts. Can you imagine?" I said, imagining all of the possible scenarios I would get myself into.

"He'd just be mad that you'd be better at his job than he is," she joked, and I smiled. I have to admit, that would make me pretty happy. "You'd be a good CSI, though, in all honesty. I think you've got what it takes," she added, making me smile even bigger. It's nice to have people believe in you when it seems that nobody else does.

"Really? I've thought about it. Not here though. Never," I said sincerely. I didn't even want to entertain the possibility of coming back to visit, let alone being here on a permanent basis.

"Yeah, I can see it happening. CSI Ecklie the second," she laughed. I rolled my eyes playfully.

"I've been thinking of changing my last name when my mom finally gets married," I suddenly admitted. I had never said that out loud to anyone, not even when I was talking to myself or anything.

"Good for you. I think that's great, really. Morgan Brody sounds cute… It will be a rough conversation, though," Catherine replied honestly. I nodded.

"I know. But every conversation my dad and I have is rough, though." As terrible as that sounded, it was only the complete truth.

Much later, more into the early evening, when I had insisted that I could take care of myself while Catherine slept, the phone rang. Just my luck, of course. I'm basically by myself in a completely unfamiliar place, and the phone rings. Answering the phone at my own house was bad enough.

"Hello?" I said cautiously after finding the phone.

"Morgan?" Are you kidding me?

"Hi," I said icily, wanting to hang up on my father immediately.

"Listen, I'm probably going to work a double shift, but I can pick you up in the morning and we can do something," he explained. "Is that okay?" he added, possibly trying to make peace.

"Yeah, fine, whatever. I don't care… It's better here anyway. Bye," I said, hanging up. If that conversation continued, it would have ended up uglier than the one yesterday, so at least I had the decency to quit while we weren't even ahead, right?

I sat on the couch, absent-mindedly watching TV while waiting to tell Catherine that her house guest was going to be overstaying her welcome, but didn't have a choice about it. Neither her nor I minded, I presume, but I really shouldn't have been over in the first place, right?

As I sat there, I wondered how this trip was going to end between my dad and I. Would it leave us in an even worse place? It probably would, even though when it was planned, I was almost totally willing to fix everything. That's just how my life had been working, I assume; thinking one thing, while the complete opposite was the actual reality.

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Spring break is next week, so hopefully more updates than there have been lately then :) Thank you so much for reading, and I love reading your reviews; they make me smile. :)


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